Any recommended RISC-V SBCs for Nerves?

AstonJ

I’ve become increasingly interested in RISC-V hardware due to the risks associated with other processors and their potential backdoors (Intel Management Engine (ME) and AMD Platform Security Processor (PSP) etc) and so an air-gapped RISC-V SBC seems like a good option (no hidden/proprietary/closed-source subsystems). I need the SBC to work on a sensitive piece which I would like to be as secure as possible (hence air-gapped) so only need it temporarily, however thinking ahead it would be nice if I can later re-use the hardware for something Nerves related

Hence wondering what the current status of RISC-V and Nerves is, and whether anyone has successfully used any RISC-V SBCs with Nerves or has any recommendations. One I quite liked the look of was the VisionFive2, as it ticks a lot of my boxes.

The Nerves system I will want to use it for eventually will basically be an intelligent sauna fan, to pump warm air from the top back into the bottom (so a bit like a Saunum heater).

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/nerves #risc-v #sbc #visionfive2

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2026-08-09 21:49:37 UTC

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AstonJ

That’s good to know - thanks! I guess I could always post here if I get stuck, but it’s good to know it’s more than likely feasible. Just need to find the time now

Tell us more!

^{When you can}

Post #4

lawik

Nerves Core Team

The easiest to use is a Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 (because USB-C) soon to be beaten by Nerves Starter Kit (soon™)

It is perfectly doable to bring any board that can run Linux with about 200MB RAM up with Nerves. So those boards you mentioned are probably fully feasible. I don’t know of anyone having done work to pave the way. But then again, people get a new system up with Nerves via LLM all the time these days. It is mostly about pulling together some buildroot, some linux sources and any vendor nonsense needed.

Post #3

AstonJ

Thanks Gus!

It’s great to hear Nerves supports RISC-V

The MangoPi MQ Pro looks very cool, though the SBC I need for this particular piece can’t have wifi or bt, hence was looking at the VisionFive2 and the Milk-V Mars (which I really like but it’s been out of stock for a while). Would either of those work with Nerves or is it more a case of having to try to see?

It’s not a big deal that I get to re-use this SBC with my Nerves sauna project, but just thought it was worth asking just in case. (Think we probably beed a “What’s the best/easiest MCU or SBC to use with Nerves” if we haven’t already got one )

Post #2

gus

Nerves Core Team

Hey Aston!

Nerves does support RISC-V, and there’s an officially maintained system for the RISC-V based MangoPi MQ Pro: https://github.com/nerves-project/nerves_system_mangopi_mq_pro

It’s definitely not a computing powerhouse, at only 1GHz single core, based on the Allwinner D1 chipset. But it does have a rich set of peripherals. I think you can buy them on AliExpress for around €30.

It’s probably the lowest barrier to entry to get started with RISC-V and Nerves. At the very least it would be a good reference if you choose some different hardware