The Arduino IDE 2.0 is the new official IDE for sketch development, the 1.8 and older versions are from now on legacy. This means that the Arduino team must be pretty confident about their new IDE. So, what exactly does it offer to justify switching over to the new IDE?

Arduino IDE 2.0 – What’s With the Left Menu Bar?

Version 2 of the IDE looks quite similar to version v1.8. Its main differences seem to be its new looks with a menu bar on the side, a debug interface, autocomplete, and more sophisticated search functions. Also, boards are detected automatically and different IDE windows can compile for different boards without interfering with each other.

There is also a vertical menu bar on the left, but the choice of the buttons are a bit surprising. One can understand a File Open (but no File Save button?) and Search button, but why do the Boards and Library Manager need buttons? You hardly ever need the Boards Manager. Furthermore, the new IDE’s board auto-detect function opens it for you if you connect a board you didn’t use before, making the button even less important.

The Library Manager is used a bit more often, but once you have installed all your favorite libraries, you hardly ever need it again.

Join us for a closer look at the IDE and its new Debug button in this video:
 

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