Beyond Arduino: Getting Started with ESP-IDF in VS Code for ESP32

Note: This tutorial was originally published on effessdev.github.io. Check out the original article for the most up-to-date version: https://effessdev.github.io/posts/2026-07-27/

This is a step-by-step tutorial that explains how you can set up your development environment for working with ESP-IDF projects in VS Code.

Install ESP-IDF

Install EIM

Espressif Systems provides a graphical tool called EIM (ESP-IDF Installation Manager) to install ESP-IDF. Click the link below to go to the official page to download EIM: