9 of the 20 features in our table differ between the ESP32-C3 and the ESP32-H2.
Small RISC-V, Wi-Fi 4, BLE 5, 5 µA deep sleep
A small, low-cost RISC-V chip with Wi-Fi 4, Bluetooth LE 5, USB Serial/JTAG built in and 5 µA in deep sleep.
Watch out: One core, no PSRAM and only 5 ADC pins you can rely on, since ESP-IDF doesn’t support ADC2.
Thread, Zigbee and BLE, no Wi-Fi
No Wi-Fi: Thread, Zigbee and Bluetooth LE only, made for battery sensors in a mesh network.
Watch out: It needs a Thread border router, a Zigbee coordinator or a BLE gateway to reach your network.
| Feature | ESP32-C3 | ESP32-H2 |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | 1 × RISC-V, 160 MHz | 1 × RISC-V, 96 MHz |
| SRAM | 400 KB | 320 KB |
| Wi-Fi | Wi-Fi 4 (802.11 b/g/n), 2.4 GHz | No |
| Bluetooth | LE 5 | LE 5.3 |
| Thread / Zigbee | No | Yes (802.15.4) |
| GPIO | 22 | 19 |
| ADC channels | 6 (ADC1: 5) | 5 |
| Deep sleep | 5 µA | 7 µA |
| ESPHome | Yes (ESP-IDF or Arduino) | Yes (ESP-IDF, over Thread) |
Same on both: Low-power core, PSRAM, USB, DAC, Touch pins, Camera, Display interface, TWAI (CAN), Ethernet MAC, AI / DSP, and Arduino-ESP32.
Open the ESP32 comparison →Tick what your project needs and see which of the eight chips fits best.
The ESP32-C3 has Wi-Fi on the chip (Wi-Fi 4 on 2.4 GHz), a faster CPU (160 against 96 MHz), more internal SRAM (400 against 320 KB), and a lower deep-sleep current (5 against 7 µA). The ESP32-H2 has a lean radio for battery end devices on Thread or Zigbee (no Wi-Fi to power or set up) and Thread or Zigbee.
The ESP32-C3: 5 µA against 7 µA for the ESP32-H2, as typical figures for the chip alone in Espressif’s datasheets. On a development board the regulator, the LEDs and the USB-serial chip usually draw more than the chip itself.
Arduino-ESP32 and ESP-IDF support both chips, so most code builds for either; pin numbers, strapping pins and some peripherals change. Anything that uses Wi-Fi on the chip (Wi-Fi 4 on 2.4 GHz) won’t carry over: the ESP32-H2 doesn’t have that hardware. In ESPHome the ESP32-H2 works only with the ESP-IDF framework, so components that need Arduino won’t build.
ESP32 vs ESP32-C3 ESP32 vs ESP32-H2 ESP32-C3 vs ESP32-C5 ESP32-C3 vs ESP32-C6 ESP32-C3 vs ESP32-P4 ESP32-C3 vs ESP32-S2 ESP32-C3 vs ESP32-S3 ESP32-C5 vs ESP32-H2 ESP32-C6 vs ESP32-H2 ESP32-H2 vs ESP32-P4 ESP32-H2 vs ESP32-S2 ESP32-H2 vs ESP32-S3
Figures from Espressif datasheets, ESPHome and Arduino-ESP32 documentation, checked in November 2026.