Pulse Width Modulation

Pulse width modulation (PWM) is a way to get an artificial analog output on a digital pin. It achieves this by rapidly toggling the pin from low to high. There are two parameters associated with this: the frequency of the toggling, and the duty cycle. The duty cycle is defined to be how long the pin is high compared with the length of a single period (low plus high time). Maximum duty cycle is when the pin is high all of the time, and minimum is when it is low all of the time.

More comprehensive example with all 16 PWM channels and 8 timers:

from time import sleep
from machine import Pin, PWM
try:
    F = 10000  # Hz
    D = 65536 // 16  # 6.25%
    pins = (2, 4, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 22, 23, 25, 26, 27, 32, 33)
    pwms = []
    for i, pin in enumerate(pins):
        f = F * (i // 2 + 1)
        d = min(65535, D * (i + 1))
        pwms.append(PWM(pin, freq=f, duty_u16=d))
        sleep(2 / f)
        print(pwms[i])
finally:
    for pwm in pwms:
        try:
            pwm.deinit()
        except:
            pass

Output is:

PWM(Pin(2), freq=10000, duty_u16=4096)
PWM(Pin(4), freq=10000, duty_u16=8192)
PWM(Pin(12), freq=20000, duty_u16=12288)
PWM(Pin(13), freq=20000, duty_u16=16384)
PWM(Pin(14), freq=30030, duty_u16=20480)
PWM(Pin(15), freq=30030, duty_u16=24576)
PWM(Pin(16), freq=40000, duty_u16=28672)
PWM(Pin(18), freq=40000, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(19), freq=50000, duty_u16=36864)
PWM(Pin(22), freq=50000, duty_u16=40960)
PWM(Pin(23), freq=60060, duty_u16=45056)
PWM(Pin(25), freq=60060, duty_u16=49152)
PWM(Pin(26), freq=69930, duty_u16=53248)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=69930, duty_u16=57344)
PWM(Pin(32), freq=80000, duty_u16=61440)
PWM(Pin(33), freq=80000, duty_u16=65535)

Example of a smooth frequency change:

from time import sleep
from machine import Pin, PWM

F_MIN = 1000
F_MAX = 10000

f = F_MIN
delta_f = F_MAX // 50

pwm = PWM(Pin(27), f)

while True:
    pwm.freq(f)
    sleep(1 / f)
    sleep(0.1)
    print(pwm)

    f += delta_f
    if f > F_MAX or f < F_MIN:
        delta_f = -delta_f
        print()
        if f > F_MAX:
            f = F_MAX
        elif f < F_MIN:
            f = F_MIN

See PWM wave on Pin(27) with an oscilloscope.

Output is:

PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=1202, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=1401, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=1598, duty_u16=32768)
...
PWM(Pin(27), freq=9398, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=9615, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=9804, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=10000, duty_u16=32768)

PWM(Pin(27), freq=10000, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=9804, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=9615, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=9398, duty_u16=32768)
...
PWM(Pin(27), freq=1598, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=1401, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=1202, duty_u16=32768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=32768)

Example of a smooth duty change:

from time import sleep
from machine import Pin, PWM

DUTY_MAX = 65535

duty_u16 = 0
delta_d = 256

pwm = PWM(Pin(27), freq=1000, duty_u16=duty_u16)

while True:
    pwm.duty_u16(duty_u16)
    sleep(2 / pwm.freq())
    print(pwm)

    if duty_u16 >= DUTY_MAX:
        print()
        sleep(2)
    elif duty_u16 <= 0:
        print()
        sleep(2)

    duty_u16 += delta_d
    if duty_u16 >= DUTY_MAX:
        duty_u16 = DUTY_MAX
        delta_d = -delta_d
    elif duty_u16 <= 0:
        duty_u16 = 0
        delta_d = -delta_d

PWM wave on Pin(27) with an oscilloscope.

Output is:

PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=0)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=256)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=512)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=1024)
...
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=64512)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=64768)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=65024)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=65280)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=65535)

PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=65279)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=65023)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=64767)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=64511)
...
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=1023)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=767)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=511)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=255)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=998, duty_u16=0)

Example of a smooth duty change and PWM output inversion:

from utime import sleep
from machine import Pin, PWM

try:
    DUTY_MAX = 65535

    duty_u16 = 0
    delta_d = 65536 // 32

    pwm = PWM(Pin(27))
    pwmi = PWM(Pin(32), invert=1)

    while True:
        pwm.duty_u16(duty_u16)
        pwmi.duty_u16(duty_u16)

        duty_u16 += delta_d
        if duty_u16 >= DUTY_MAX:
            duty_u16 = DUTY_MAX
            delta_d = -delta_d
        elif duty_u16 <= 0:
            duty_u16 = 0
            delta_d = -delta_d

        sleep(.01)
        print(pwm)
        print(pwmi)

finally:
    try:
        pwm.deinit()
    except:
        pass
    try:
        pwmi.deinit()
    except:
        pass

Output is:

PWM(Pin(27), freq=5000, duty_u16=0)
PWM(Pin(32), freq=5000, duty_u16=32768, invert=1)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=5000, duty_u16=2048)
PWM(Pin(32), freq=5000, duty_u16=2048, invert=1)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=5000, duty_u16=4096)
PWM(Pin(32), freq=5000, duty_u16=4096, invert=1)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=5000, duty_u16=6144)
PWM(Pin(32), freq=5000, duty_u16=6144, invert=1)
PWM(Pin(27), freq=5000, duty_u16=8192)
PWM(Pin(32), freq=5000, duty_u16=8192, invert=1)
...

See PWM waves on Pin(27) and Pin(32) with an oscilloscope.

Note: New PWM parameters take effect in the next PWM cycle.

pwm = PWM(2, duty=512) print(pwm) >>> PWM(Pin(2), freq=5000, duty=1023) # the duty is not relevant pwm.init(freq=2, duty=64) print(pwm) >>> PWM(Pin(2), freq=2, duty=16) # the duty is not relevant time.sleep(1 / 2) # wait one PWM period print(pwm) >>> PWM(Pin(2), freq=2, duty=64) # the duty is actual

Note: machine.freq(20_000_000) reduces the highest PWM frequency to 10 MHz.

Note: the Pin.OUT mode does not need to be specified. The channel is initialized to PWM mode internally once for each Pin that is passed to the PWM constructor.

The following code is wrong:

pwm = PWM(Pin(5, Pin.OUT), freq=1000, duty=512)  # Pin(5) in PWM mode here
pwm = PWM(Pin(5, Pin.OUT), freq=500, duty=256)  # Pin(5) in OUT mode here, PWM is off

Use this code instead:

pwm = PWM(Pin(5), freq=1000, duty=512)
pwm.init(freq=500, duty=256)