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EasyEDA 2 KiCad Guide!!!

A lot of us probably went through the pain of using EasyEDA when starting pcb designing. It's a free and espcially easy to use tool, but it gets really annoying with performance and ux very quickly... But even though it has a lot of issues, a switch to KiCad seemed impossible due to EasyEDA's immense library of components and the fact that KiCad's library is not as extensive. But in this guide, I'll try to show you how to get the best of both worlds and use EasyEDA's libraries in KiCad!!!

Step 1: Instaling the EasyEDA2Kicad script

(You need python3 for this to work :pf:)

  1. Just install it with pip! bash pip install easyeda2kicad

Note: You might use pip3 instead of pip if you have both python2 and python3 installed.

  1. If you didn't do this already, you need to add python's bin directory to your PATH.The path is usually something like this:

    • On MacOS : Add this to your ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc: bash export PATH="$PATH:$HOME/Library/Python/<version|3.9 for me>/bin/easyeda2kicad
    • On Linux: Add this to your ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc: bash export PATH="$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin/easyeda2kicad"
    • On Windows: Add this to your PATH environment variable: C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Python\Python<version|3.9 for me>\Scripts

  2. Restart your terminal to apply the changes!!

Step 2: Adding the generated librairies to KiCad

  1. In Kicad, go to Preferences > Configure Paths... and set the EASYEDA2KICAD variable to the path to:

    • On MacOS: /Users/<username>/Documents/Kicad/easyeda2kicad
    • On Linux: /home/<username>/Documents/Kicad/easyeda2kicad
    • On Windows: C:\Users\<username>\Documents\Kicad\easyeda2kicad

  2. Now, go to your schematic editor, and click on Preferences > Manage Symbol Libraries.... Then, click on the +icon to add a new library. Its name should be easyeda2kicad, and the path should be set to: ${EASYEDA2KICAD}/easyeda2kicad.kicad_sym

  3. Now, go to your PCB editor, and click on Preferences > Manage Footprint Libraries.... Then, click on the + icon to add a new library. Its name should be easyeda2kicad, and the path should be set to: ${EASYEDA2KICAD}/easyeda2kicad.pretty

Step 3: Bleh

Now that you have everything set up, you can use the script to get all of the footprints/symbols/3d models of your favorite components from EasyEDA! Just some quick warnings: - Some components might have a cluttered/broken footprint; - Some components might not have a 3d model; - Some components might already exist in KiCad's library! So before you use this script, try to search for the component in KiCad's library first or even design your own symbol/footprint! (a guide soon fs)

Step 4: Using the script!!!

So now that you have everything set up, you can grab the id of your favourite component and run the script like this: bash easyeda2kicad --full --lcsc_id=<ur id here> Note this will download the symbol, footprint and 3d model of the component with the specified id! if you don't need everything just specify --symbol, --footprint or --3dmodel instead of --full!

But uh you're maybe going to ask: How do I get the id of the super shiny component I just found?. Well it's simple! Once you found the component on LCSC, just copy the field shown on the image below:

lcsc id