Design of a smart hydroponics monitoring system using an ESP32 microcontroller and the Internet of Things

MethodsX. 2023 Sep 25:11:102401. doi: 10.1016/j.mex.2023.102401. eCollection 2023 Dec.

Abstract

This paper presents the design and construction of a hydroponics monitoring system that can collect parameters of hydroponic systems, such as temperature, water limit, pH level, and nutrient levels. The monitoring system was developed using an ESP32 microcontroller and several sensors, including total dissolved solids (TDS), pH, water level, and temperature sensors. The ESP32 microcontroller gathers and processes data from the sensors to automatically activate the water or salt pump and drain the necessary materials into the hydroponic system's plant basin. The user can then view the hydroponic parameters through the Blynk application on a smartphone. The user can also activate the pumps for water, nutrients, or salt using the application's interface on a smartphone, or the ESP32 microcontroller can activate them automatically if the parameter values deviate from the required values. The monitoring hydroponics system and IoT interface were successfully built and implemented. The experiments were compiled, and the data gathered and discussed.•An ESP32 microcontroller with TDS, pH, water level, and temperature sensors was used to build the hydroponic monitoring system.•The ESP32 automatically collects and evaluates sensor data in order to drain water nutrients, or salt into the plant basin of the hydroponic system as necessary.•The user can also check the parameters of the hydroponic system and, if necessary, run the pumps for water, fertilizers, or salt using his smartphone through the Blynk IoT app.

Keywords: Blynk app; ESP32; IoT; Monitoring hydroponics; TDS sensor; monitoring Hydroponics system using IoT; pH sensor.