For a sensor gateway, a Zigbee/MQTT box or a small network service, the RK3588 boards are overkill. The H618 Zero boards cover this class.
Side by side (official product pages)
| Orange Pi Zero 3 | Orange Pi Zero 2W | |
|---|---|---|
| SoC | Allwinner H618, 4× Cortex-A53 at 1.5 GHz | Allwinner H618, 4× Cortex-A53 at 1.5 GHz |
| RAM | 1 / 1.5 / 2 / 4 GB LPDDR4 | 1 / 1.5 / 2 / 4 GB LPDDR4 |
| Storage | microSD, 16 MB SPI flash | microSD, 16 MB SPI flash |
| Wireless | Wi-Fi 5 + Bluetooth 5.0 | Wi-Fi 5 + Bluetooth 5.0 |
| Wired Ethernet | gigabit on board | 100M, only via the 24-pin extension/adapter |
| Header | 26-pin, plus a 13-pin interface (USB 2.0, audio, TV-out, IR) via adapter board | 40-pin, plus a 24-pin interface (2× USB 2.0, 100M Ethernet, IR, audio, TV-out, buttons) |
| Display | micro-HDMI (4K) | mini-HDMI (4K@60) |
| Power | USB-C | USB-C 5 V / 2 A or 3 A |
| Size | 50 × 55 mm | 30 × 65 mm |
Which one
- Wired gateway (Ethernet to the router, Zigbee/BLE on USB): Zero 3, for gigabit Ethernet on the board.
- Wireless node or embedded in a device, where size matters and you want the 40-pin layout: Zero 2W.
- Both boards have only USB 2.0; a Zigbee or BLE dongle fits well, fast storage doesn't.
- Zero 2 vs Zero 3: the older Orange Pi Zero 2 uses the Allwinner H616 with 512 MB or 1 GB DDR3 and 2 MB SPI flash; the Zero 3 has the H618 with LPDDR4 and 16 MB SPI flash. Check which one a listing actually sells.
Software notes
- Both are supported by orangepi-build (H616 family: Zero2 / Zero2w / Zero3) for building your own images.
- Armbian lists the Orange Pi Zero3 with Community support (see the Armbian status item).
- For GPIO, use wiringOP and read the pin map with
gpio readallon the actual board; the 26-pin and 40-pin layouts map to different pins.