Skip to content

How do I flash firmware to my badge?

If your badge is one of ours and uses an ESP32, ESP32-S2, or ESP32-S3, the easiest way to flash firmware is through our web flasher — no software install required.

Web Flasher

  1. Visit firmware.badgepirates.com
  2. Plug your badge into your computer with a USB cable
  3. Pick your badge from the dropdown
  4. Click Connect and select your badge's serial port from the browser dialog
  5. Click Install — the flasher will write the firmware over USB

The web flasher works in any Chromium-based browser (Chrome, Edge, Brave, Opera) thanks to the Web Serial API. Firefox and Safari are not supported — Web Serial isn't available there.

What if my badge isn't in the dropdown?

The flasher only knows about badges we've explicitly added. If you have an older or one-off BadgePirates badge that isn't listed, hop on the Discord and ask — we may have firmware archived somewhere, or someone in the community might.

Reflashing at a conference

If you're at an event where we have a table, just bring your badge — we'll often reflash it on the spot, no charge. This is especially common when we ship updated firmware after a conference.

Manual flashing (advanced)

If you'd rather flash from the command line or your own toolchain, the binaries are available in either:

  • The badge's project repo on our GitHub, or
  • Our public S3 bucket (badgepirates-firmware.s3.amazonaws.com/<badge-key>/)

You can use esptool.py to flash them yourself. Each manifest file lists the offsets and parts for that specific badge.

Help! Something went wrong

The most common issues are:

Problem Likely fix
Browser can't see the badge Check the USB cable — some are charge-only and have no data lines
"No serial ports available" Try a different USB port; on macOS you may need to install drivers for the USB-to-serial chip
Firefox or Safari Switch to a Chromium browser — Web Serial isn't supported elsewhere
Flash hangs at "Connecting..." Hold the BOOT button on your badge while clicking Connect (forces bootloader mode)

If you're still stuck, the Discord is the fastest way to get help.