Bluno Bee Bluetooth Module With Arduino - Lesson #22

I've recently posted a tutorial about this project on YouTube explaining everything you can read on this article. You can watch it right below.

Introduction

What if you could control your Arduino directly from your phone - no wires, no internet, just Bluetooth?

In this tutorial, you'll learn how to connect your Arduino to a smartphone using a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) module. By the end, you'll be able to turn an LED on and off wirelessly using a simple mobile app.

This is a great introduction to wireless communication and a solid first step into the world of IoT.

If you're new here, welcome! This is lesson 22 of a 24-part series called Arduino for Beginners, where we build projects step by step.

Alright, let's get started.

Components

For this project, you'll need:

• Arduino UNO
• I/O expansion shield
• Bluno Bee Bluetooth module
• Red LED
• Jumper wire

Meet the Bluno Bee Module

To add Bluetooth to our Arduino, we'll use the Bluno Bee module. This is a BLE module designed to work seamlessly with Arduino boards.

One of its biggest advantages is simplicity. It communicates with Arduino using serial communication, which means you don't need to deal with complex Bluetooth protocols. You just send and receive data through the Serial interface.

In practice, this makes the module very beginner-friendly.

The Bluno Bee also supports AT commands, which allow you to configure settings like the device name and baud rate. For this project, we'll use it in its default configuration (no need for AT configuration).

Sponsor

Before we move on, a quick thank you to DFRobot for sponsoring this article.

DFRobot is a well-known provider of open-source hardware for makers, students, and engineers. On their website, you can find everything from Arduino-compatible boards and sensors to robotics kits and development tools.

For this series, they provided the MindPlus Arduino Coding Kit - a set of components designed to help beginners get hands-on experience with electronics and programming.

If you want to follow along with these lessons more easily, I highly recommend checking it out. It's a great way to practice what you're learning here.

Thanks again to DFRobot for supporting this series and helping make STEM education more accessible.

Now let's get back to the project.

Project

In today's project, we're going to connect our phone to an Arduino using Bluetooth and control an LED wirelessly.

Start by attaching the I/O expansion shield to your Arduino. Then plug the Bluno Bee module into the appropriate socket on the shield.

Next, connect your LED to digital pin 2.

Once everything is connected, go to the GitHub repository for this series and download the code file called control-led.

Open it in the Arduino IDE and upload it to your board.

This code listens for characters sent over serial communication. When it receives the letter "A", it turns the LED on. When it receives "B", it turns it off.

Now let's move to the mobile app.

Mobile App Setup

Inside the same folder, you'll find two files:

• ControlLED.apk
• ControlLED.aia

The.apk file is the Android app ready to install.

The.aia file is the MIT App Inventor project, which you can open and modify if you want to customize the app.

For this video, we'll use the APK directly.

Transfer it to your Android phone and install it. You may need to allow installation from unknown sources.

Once installed, open the app.

Make sure Bluetooth and Location are enabled on your phone. These permissions are required for BLE scanning to work properly.

Testing the System

Then tap on Start Scan.

The app will begin searching for nearby Bluetooth Low Energy devices. After a few seconds, you should see a list of devices.

Look for the one called BLE-Link - that's your Bluno Bee module. Tap on it to connect.

If everything works correctly, the status in the app will change to "Connected", and you'll also see an indicator LED on the module turn on.

Now for the fun part.

Tap the Turn On LED button - your LED should light up. Tap Turn Off LED and it should turn off.

What's happening here is simple: the app is sending a single character over Bluetooth, and your Arduino is reading that character through the serial interface and acting on it.

If you disconnect from the device and try pressing the buttons again, nothing will happen because the communication link is no longer active.

And that's it. You now have wireless control over your Arduino using Bluetooth.

What's Next?

Now that you've built a basic Bluetooth control system, you can take this project further.

Instead of sending commands from your phone to the Arduino, try sending data in the opposite direction. For example, you could connect a sensor to your Arduino and display its readings in the app.

This is the foundation of many real-world IoT applications.

And if you do so, let me know in the comments below.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, you learned how to use Bluetooth Low Energy with Arduino to create a simple wireless control system.

You connected a phone to an Arduino, sent commands over Bluetooth, and controlled an LED remotely.

This project is a great starting point for exploring wireless communication and building more advanced connected systems.

And if you want to learn more about Arduino, check out this tutorial where I teach you how to use the DHT11 sensor to monitor the weather.