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Knobby: a little remote, a lot of possibilities

Spin the knob to browse 5,000+ genres of music along with your own playlists. Knobby is a distinctive remote control for Spotify and more.

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Explore a universe of music with just a knob:

Knobby is a remote made for discovering new music and rediscovering your own collection. It’s the perfect companion to a smart speaker, allowing you to browse playlists, see what’s playing, and control playback without interrupting anything. Preloaded with thousands of genre and country playlists from everynoise.com, it encourages you to explore unfamiliar music and puts all of Spotify on shuffle.

Untether music from your phone
Bring music discovery into your living room with a device that’s meant to be shared and free from distracting apps or notifications. Show off your meticulously curated collection to people in your home, or pass it around at a party and put your guests in control.

Pop your filter bubble
Streaming services feed you new releases and top hits through algorithmic recommendations and branded playlists, but how do you dig deeper? Knobby is your musicological compendium: a vast index of musical expression that rewards your exploration, not a marketplace of content competing for your attention.

Control your home, computer and more
Knobby controls any Spotify Connect compatible device, like Amazon Echo or Sonos speakers. It's also open source, ready to serve as a foundation for your own remote control projects. Build your own custom game controller, assistive input device, or home automation remote with the Arduino-compatible ESP32 board inside.

  • 1 × LILYGO TTGO T-Display ESP32 development board
  • 1 × Bourns PEC11R-4215F-S0024 Rotary encoder with pushbutton
  • 1 × 1100mAh LiPo battery with micro JST 1.25 connector

  • 1
    Wire it up
    rotary encoder and t-display wiring diagram
    1. Connect the rotary encoder A and B pins to GPIO pins 12 and 13.
    2. Connect one pole of the switch to GPIO pin 15.
    3. Connect other pole of the switch and the encoder’s remaining middle pin to ground.
  • 2
    Install the firmware

    ➡️ setup.knobby.net

    The Knobby setup tool can flash the latest firmware and configure WiFi credentials over USB (requires Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge for Web Serial API support).

    Alternatively, you can download the latest release and flash it yourself. You will need to have Python and esptool.py installed. With the USB cable connected, run the flash script in the directory of the extracted firmware zip:

    • on Linux or Mac: ./flash.sh
    • on Windows: flash.bat
  • 3
    Compile from source
    1. Edit data/data.json and enter your wifi network information (if you want; it can also be configured later)
    2. Build and upload with PlatformIO: pio run && pio run --target upload && pio run --target uploadfs

    If data.json is not configured or there is a problem connecting to your network, Knobby will enter configuration mode. Join the temporary WiFi network displayed on screen and wait for the configuration portal to appear or visit http://192.168.4.1. Enter your WiFi network information, then switch back to your normal WiFi network and visit http://knobby.local to continue.

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