Seeed Studio has released two thumb-sized development boards built on Nordic Semiconductor's nRF54LM20A system-on-chip: the XIAO nRF54LM20A and the XIAO nRF54LM20A Sense. Nordic announced the release in an Oslo-datelined news item on Sept 28, 2026. Both boards measure 21 x 17.8 mm and pair the SoC with Nordic's nPM1300 power-management IC, which handles battery charging, voltage regulation and fuel gauging. The Sense variant adds a 6-axis IMU and a digital microphone.
Cores, memory and radio
According to Nordic's announcement, the nRF54LM20A has a 128 MHz Arm Cortex-M33 alongside a 128 MHz RISC-V coprocessor, with 512 KB RAM and 2 MB on-chip NVM. Its 2.4 GHz multiprotocol radio supports Bluetooth LE, Bluetooth Channel Sounding, Bluetooth Mesh, Thread, Zigbee and Matter, plus proprietary 2.4 GHz protocols up to 4 Mbps. On the board side, Nordic lists 28 GPIOs, USB Type-C, 8 MB external flash, NFC and an external antenna interface. Security features include secure boot, secure firmware updates, secure storage, a TrustZone-enabled trusted execution environment, cryptographic acceleration with side-channel protection, and tamper detection.
Seeed's getting-started wiki page specifies Bluetooth LE 6.0 with Channel Sounding, adds Amazon Sidewalk to the protocol list, names the antenna connector as IPEX4 and identifies the sensors on the Sense board. Seeed recommends fitting an external antenna for better Bluetooth signal.
| Item | XIAO nRF54LM20A | XIAO nRF54LM20A Sense |
|---|---|---|
| SoC | nRF54LM20A: 128 MHz Arm Cortex-M33 + 128 MHz RISC-V coprocessor | |
| PMIC | nPM1300 | |
| Memory | 512 KB RAM, 2 MB on-chip NVM, 8 MB external flash | |
| I/O | 28 GPIO, 9 analog pins; 1x I2C, 1x UART, 1x SPI; NFC | |
| Onboard | RGB user LED, charge LED, reset button, user button, SHPHLD pin | |
| Antenna | IPEX4 connector | |
| Power input | USB Type-C 5 V or 3.7 V battery | |
| IMU | None | LSM6DS3TR-C (6-axis) |
| Microphone | None | MSM261DGT006 digital (PDM) mic |
| Operating temperature | -20 to 70 °C | |
| Dimensions | 21 x 17.8 mm | |
The Zephyr Project's board page fills in lower-level hardware detail. The RISC-V core is the Fast Lightweight Peripheral Processor (FLPR). The external flash is a 64 Mbit PY25Q64HA. An onboard SAMD11 running CMSIS-DAP handles flashing, debugging and logging over USB. The SoC also has a 14-bit SAADC, PDM and TDM audio interfaces, and TrustZone isolation.
Power figures
Nordic pitches the boards at battery-powered applications. Seeed's wiki publishes these current measurements:
- Light sleep: ~9.96 µA
- Deep sleep (System OFF): ~4.76 µA
- Deep sleep (System OFF, GRTC wake-up): ~4.92 µA
- Ship mode: 0.33 µA
- Active wireless: average ~3.87 mA, measured with a simulated 3.7 V battery input and TX power at +8 dBm
These are Seeed's own measurements under the conditions it states. For battery connection and charging, follow Seeed's wiki.
Where it sits in the XIAO line
Seeed's earlier wireless XIAO boards used Nordic's nRF52840 and nRF54L15. In Nordic's announcement, Kevin Yang, Senior Product Manager and Maker Team Lead at Seeed Studio, called the nRF54LM20A "a natural evolution of our wireless product family". Seeed also plans an XIAO nRF54LM20B version, aimed at next-generation low-power edge AI devices; Nordic describes it as upcoming and gives no date or specifications.
What It Means for Makers
Who it is for. Both boards target makers building battery-powered Bluetooth LE, Thread, Zigbee or Matter devices, with charging and fuel gauging handled by the onboard PMIC. The Sense variant suits projects that need motion or audio input from onboard sensors.
Software support. Nordic lists support for the nRF Connect SDK, Zephyr RTOS and PlatformIO. In Zephyr, the application-core board target is xiao_nrf54lm20a/nrf54lm20a/cpuapp, with a separate xiao_nrf54lm20a/nrf54lm20a/cpuflpr target for the coprocessor. Zephyr's board page marks the port "Not actively maintained", and its connections table maps only D0 to D10 even though the overview describes pins D0 to D27, so Seeed's wiki is the better pin reference.
Getting one. Both boards are released, per Nordic's Sept 28 announcement. Neither Nordic nor Seeed's wiki lists a price; the wiki links to Seeed's online store for purchase, where current pricing and stock are shown.
