Circuit Digest has a new tutorial ESP32 based Bluetooth iBeacon. ESP32 is a small single board computer that can easily be programmed to do different tasks. Many ESP32 boards include Bluetooth so it’s possible to program them to be an iBeacon.
![](https://www.beaconzone.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/ESP32Bluetoothibeacon.jpg)
The article first explains how to detect beacons on Android using nRF Connect. This is similar to our post Testing if a Beacon is Working. There’s also a useful table that explains the different ranges for received signal strength (RSSI):
![](https://www.beaconzone.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/rssiranges.png)
Creating your own beacons means you can customise the advertising and do other IoT-related things at the same. The downside is bare ESP32 boards aren’t as physically robust, easy to configure nor power friendly as a dedicated beacon.