Nordic Semiconductor designs and produces SoC, SiP, and connectivity solutions for the ISM bands at 5 GHz, 2.4 GHz and 868/915 MHz bands. The products operate on low power, enabling wireless and IoT applications to use little battery and run on harvested energy.
Current products include SoCs incorporating the ARM Cortex-M0, ARM Cortex-M4 and ARM Cortex-M33 microcontroller cores.
Popular products include the nRF24L01+ and the nRF24LE1, both using the lightweight and proprietary "Enhanced ShockBurst" (ESB) protocol stack in 2.4 GHz ISM band. The nRF24L01+ is a simple transceiver with some logic to implement the protocol stack and is connected to a microcontroller via an SPI bus, while the nRF24LE1 can be seen as an nRF24L01 and a microcontroller in the same chip.
The nRF9160 SiP expanded Nordic Semiconductor's lineup from mainly focusing on Bluetooth LE and other short range wireless protocol SoCs into the realm of connected devices using the cellular network for internet connectivity. The series offers LTE-M and NB-IoT connectivity.
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nRF70 Series
A Wi-Fi companion IC is designed to provide Wi-Fi connectivity and functionality to existing Nordic products. Unlike other Nordic solutions, the first product, nRF7002, is strictly for connectivity.
nRF54 Series SoC
The nRF54 Series SoC makes it possible to reduce BOM, replacing external components through a highly integrated SoC with multiple ARM Cortex-M33 processors running up to 320 MHz in conjunction with RISC-V coprocessors. nRF54H20 touts efficient processing, ultra-low power radio, and minimal sleep currents, multiprotocol radio with 10 dBm TX power, -100 dBm RX sensitivity for Bluetooth LE and -104 dBm for 802.15.4., PSA Level 3 certification, secure boot, secure firmware update, secure storage, and protection against physical attacks. In EEMBC ULPMark-CM benchmarking, configured for maximum processing efficiency, the nRF54H20 scores 170 with 515 CoreMark. Configured for maximum processing performance, the nRF54H20 scores 132 with 1290 CoreMark. Compared to the nRF54H Series' GlobalFoundries 22FDX® (22 nm) process, nRF54L Series features a new hardware architecture fabricated using TSMC’s 22ULL® (22 nm) process technology.
nRF53 Series SoC
The nRF5340 SoC is the world's first dual-core ARM Cortex-M33 SoC (128MHz + 64MHz), released in 2020. This is Nordic's new generation of wireless SoCs with a separate processor core to handle connectivity, thus freeing up resources for handling more demanding applications on the main processor's core without compromising on the connectivity.
nRF52 Series SoCs
The nRF52 Series SoCs was the second short-range wireless SoCs from Nordic Semiconductor, building on its experience developing the nRF51 Series. The nRF52 series, especially the nRF52840 and nRF52833, is very successful and exists in millions of popular consumer devices in the world today, among them wireless mice, keyboards and audio devices. The popularity of Nordic's nRF52 series allows Nordic Semiconductor to maintain a 40% worldwide market share in the Bluetooth LE segment.
The nRF52833 SoC features a 64 MHz ARM Cortex-M4. This SoC supports an extended temperature range of -40˚C to 105˚C. The SoC has a 1:4 RAM to Flash storage ratio (128 KB: 512 KB). Being a wireless-focused chip, the nRF52833 is equipped with an output power of +8 dBm.
nRF51 Series SoCs
The nRF51 Series SoCs was the first short-range wireless SoC series from Nordic Semiconductor; it was superseded by the nRF52 Series SoCs.
Power management (nPM)
Dedicated Power Management ICs (PMIC) integrate a number of functions to reduce the size, improve the power efficiency and maximise the system's battery life. The nPM Series supports power management, battery charging, and state-of-charge prediction using integrated battery current, voltage, and temperature measurements for precision estimation.
Range extenders (nRF21)
The transmit (TX) output power and the receiver sensitivity directly influence the link budget of a connection. An RF front-end module (FEM) increases the range at which two wireless devices can communicate while enhancing link robustness. nRF21540 RF FEM can boost wireless range up to 10x.
Cloud services
nRF Cloud is a platform for IoT cloud services for the nRF Series of wireless devices, including location services and Firmware Over-The-Air (FOTA).
Development software
nRF Connect SDK is a software development kit for the nRF Series of wireless devices.
Wireless technologies and protocols
Nordic Semiconductor provides hardware and software for several wireless technologies and protocols.
Cellular IoT (LTE-M/NB-IoT)
Internet of Things (IoT) devices use existing cellular networks, such as those used for mobile phones, to communicate over long distances and through walls and other barriers with greater flexibility and coverage than other wireless communication technologies.
DECT NR+
DECT Next Generation is an evolution of the DECT standard that allows any company or organization to build its own private 5G network and run and optimize as they wish.
Wi-Fi
By maximizing Wi-Fi’s low-power potential, Wi-Fi can be introduced in applications such as sensor networks, smart speakers, security cameras, home appliances, robot vacuums, and more.
Bluetooth Low Energy
Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) is a wireless personal area network technology designed for use with low-power devices.
Bluetooth LE Audio
A new Bluetooth audio standard designed to reduce power consumption and improve the performance and functionality of Bluetooth audio devices such as wireless headphones and speakers.
Bluetooth Direction Finding
Bluetooth Mesh
Matter for smart home applications
Matter uses Thread, Wi-Fi, Ethernet and Bluetooth LE to make it possible for developers to create secure and interoperable products for the major smart home ecosystems.
Thread
Zigbee
ANT+
2.4 GHz proprietary
Amazon Sidewalk
Apple Find My network
Locations
Nordic Semiconductor is headquartered in Trondheim, Norway.
R&D offices are located in Portland (US), Krakow and Wrocław (Poland), Oulu, Espoo, Tampere and Turku (Finland), Hyderabad (India), Bristol and Hertfordshire (UK), Stockholm and Lund (Sweden), and in Oslo and Trondheim (Norway).
Technical support or sales offices are located in Oslo (Norway), San Diego (US), Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hong Kong (China), Taipei (Taiwan), Manila (the Philippines), Yokohama (Japan), Seoul (South Korea), Düsseldorf (Germany), Eindhoven (the Netherlands) and London (UK).
