[SOLVED] Fix Arduino IDE ESP32 and ESP8266 Board Installation – Error Downloading URLs on Windows PC

If you’re having trouble compiling code for your ESP32 or ESP8266 boards using Arduino IDE due to an error downloading the boards’ URLs, you can follow this guide to help you fix the Arduino IDE installation on a Windows PC.

Solved fix Arduino IDE installation esp32 esp8266 nodemcu board add-on error downloading urls

If you see a similar error in your Arduino IDE or any error related to downloading URLs, cleaning your Arduino IDE installation folder usually solves this issue.

Solved Arduino IDE Installation Error downloading ESP32 ESP8266 NodeMCU

If your Arduino IDE doesn’t launch (you click the Arduino icon and nothing happens) this trick might also solve the issue.

Fixing Arduino IDE Installation

1. In your Windows PC, open the File Explorer, select View menu and enable “Hidden items“:

Arduino IDE ESP32 ESP8266 NodeMCU Board Add-on fix install

2. Go to your Windows device (for example C:), open Users and find the hidden AppData folder:

Arduino IDE ESP32 ESP8266 NodeMCU Board Add-on fix install

3. Select the AppData folder and open Local.

Arduino IDE ESP32 ESP8266 NodeMCU Board Add-on fix install

4. Open the Arduino15 folder, then I recommend deleting all files in this folder.

Arduino IDE ESP32 ESP8266 NodeMCU Board Add-on fix install

5. That’s it! Now, you just need to re-install the ESP32 and ESP8266 board add-ons.

Arduino IDE ESP32 ESP8266 NodeMCU Board Add-on fix install

Installing ESP32 and ESP8266 Board Add-on in Arduino IDE

Finally, you need to re-install the ESP board add-ons, you can either continue reading this guide or open one of the next links for more detailed instructions:

1. In your Arduino IDE, go to File > Preferences.

Installing ESP32 Add-on in Arduino IDE Windows, Mac OS X, Linux open preferences

2. Enter the following URLs into the “Additional Board Manager URLs” field as shown in the figure below.

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/espressif/arduino-esp32/gh-pages/package_esp32_index.json, http://arduino.esp8266.com/stable/package_esp8266com_index.json

Then, click the “OK” button:

3. Open the Boards Manager. Go to Tools > Board > Boards Manager…

Installing ESP32 Add-on in Arduino IDE Windows, Mac OS X, Linux open boards manager

4. Search for ESP32 and press the install button for the “ESP32 by Espressif Systems“:

ESP32 Add-on in Arduino IDE Windows, Mac OS X, Linux Installed

5. Search for ESP8266 and press install button for the “ESP8266 by ESP8266 Community“:

Install ESP8266 Board add-on in Arduino IDE search ESP8266

Testing the ESP32 and ESP8266 Board Add-on Installed in Arduino IDE

Plug the ESP32 or ESP8266 board to your computer. With your Arduino IDE open, follow these steps:

1. Select your Board in Tools > Board menu (in my case it’s the DOIT ESP32 DEVKIT V1)

Arduino IDE select the ESP32 board in Tools menu

2. Select the Port (if you don’t see the COM Port in your Arduino IDE, you need to install the CP210x USB to UART Bridge VCP Drivers):

Arduino IDE select the ESP32 Port in Tools menu

3. Open the following example (or any other example) under File > Examples > WiFi (ESP32) > WiFiScan

Arduino IDE open WiFiScan example for ESP32

4. A new sketch opens in your Arduino IDE:

Arduino IDE uploading WiFiScan example to ESP32

5. Press the Upload button in the Arduino IDE. Wait a few seconds while the code compiles and uploads to your board.

Arduino IDE upload WiFiScan sketch to ESP32

6. If everything went as expected, you should see a “Done uploading.” message.

Arduino IDE done uploading ESP32 WiFiScan sketch

If you get the “Timed out waiting for packet header” error, follow this guide: [SOLVED] Failed to connect to ESP32: Timed out waiting for packet header.

7. Open the Arduino IDE Serial Monitor at a baud rate of 115200:

Open Arduino IDE Serial Monitor at baud rate 115200

8. Press the ESP on-board Enable button and you should see the networks available near your ESP32:

ESP32 Testing Add-on installation in Windows PC, Max OS X, and Linux computer

Wrapping Up

We hope this guide fixed your Arduino IDE installation. Now, you’re ready to start building your IoT projects with the ESP32 and ESP8266 boards!

For more ESP32 troubleshooting tips, try our ESP32 Troubleshooting Guide.

You might also like reading:



Learn how to build a home automation system and we’ll cover the following main subjects: Node-RED, Node-RED Dashboard, Raspberry Pi, ESP32, ESP8266, MQTT, and InfluxDB database DOWNLOAD »
Learn how to build a home automation system and we’ll cover the following main subjects: Node-RED, Node-RED Dashboard, Raspberry Pi, ESP32, ESP8266, MQTT, and InfluxDB database DOWNLOAD »

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9 thoughts on “[SOLVED] Fix Arduino IDE ESP32 and ESP8266 Board Installation – Error Downloading URLs on Windows PC”

  1. Many thanks for this!
    My compiles for ESP32 and 8266 are very very slow (10 mins sometimes).
    I’ve stopped anti virus to try that.
    It seems to take ages compile the same stuff every time, even if I make a 1 line change, surely the caching can take care of this.

    Reply
  2. I had a problem just starting my IDE and the solution was the same – delete the arduino15 file. So my problem was more general than just downloading board URLs

    My issue was that every time I tried to start the IDE I got the message “Initialising Packages” that that’s as far as it got – it returned to the start up screen.

    There were many suggestions on Internet including deleting file arduino15. Unfortunately I didn’t appreciate it was a hidden file so couldn’t find it (immediately) to delete.

    Once I did find and delete arduino15 everything worked fine. As I was only using the UNO I will have to re-install any add ons.

    Reply
  3. Perfect!,

    Strangely though, despite a good hour googling for answers, I decided to uninstall Arduino IDE while also removing the Arduino folder in AppData. Once I reinstalled IDE and added the apt. URL’s for esp32 and esp8266 everything is running again. Then out of curiosity, I googled again to see if others had the same problem and your link was top of the page…confirming my actions as correct!

    Thanks for providing clarification with your highly informative website.

    Regards,

    Reply
  4. I was looking for a tutorial like this, but …
    Is it possible to install the esp32 and esp8266 boards without internet connection but with a file that you can download and put in the right file tree ?
    It is because at work the connection do not pass for security reason. At home with the same laptop, no problem to install.

    Reply
  5. Hi, I just bought a new esp32 board (wemos d1 mini esp32) and I am getting this error ever since it arrived. I have another which i bought last year and I dont have any issue with that one. I tried reinstalling the USB serial driver, arduino (several times), and pressing the button while uploading but nothing solved it. Hope anyone could help.
    esptool.py v3.0-dev
    Serial port COM7
    Traceback (most recent call last):
    File “esptool.py”, line 3682, in
    File “esptool.py”, line 3675, in _main
    File “esptool.py”, line 3329, in main
    File “esptool.py”, line 263, in init
    File “site-packages\serial__init__.py”, line 88, in serial_for_url
    File “site-packages\serial\serialwin32.py”, line 62, in open
    serial.serialutil.SerialException: could not open port ‘COM7’: WindowsError(5, ‘Access is denied.’)
    Failed to execute script esptool
    the selected serial port Failed to execute script esptool
    does not exist or your board is not connected

    Reply
    • Hi.
      That probably means that you didn’t select the right COM port or it is being used by another program.
      Regards,
      Sara

      Reply
  6. fatal esptool.py error occurred: Cannot configure port, something went wrong. Original message: PermissionError(13, ‘A device attached to the system is not functioning.’, None, 31)
    any body resolve my error

    Reply

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