KiCad
July 26, 2025
KiCad is a free electronic design application that allows users to create custom circuits and their respective boards.
How KiCad applies to me
I have used KiCad in my projects twice now as I designed 2 custom PCBs.
In one project (FRC Badge) I used it to make the project a lot cleaner and more profession as it would have been simpler to do on a breadboard.
But, on the second project (Hexpad), using a PCB was critical as a breadboard would have been too big/bulky to fit in a macropad. And the multiple SMD compents wold have been very difficult to use.
Projects using KiCad
- Hexpad (Highway)
- FRC Badge (Solder)
Things to learn in KiCad
Considering having only used KiCad twice I feel quite comfortable in the application, but I still know I have a lot to learn as many complicated concepts are foreign to me.
Even something as simple as tracing is something I need to work on as my traces are very basic and poorly optimized. I find myself being bailed out from vias lots of times instead of designing better.