# Nuand/bladeRF

bladeRF USB 3.0 Superspeed Software Defined Radio Source Code

Repository: https://github.com/Nuand/bladeRF
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/bladerf
Homepage: http://nuand.com
Language: C
License: NOASSERTION
License Family: other
Last push: 2026-08-21T12:53:08+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 71/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 98, release rhythm 19, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 4943, "days_push": 12, "days_rel": 331, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 1}
- flags: no_license
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1365, forks 510 (observed 2026-08-28T04:04:31.181683+00:00)

## What it is
bladeRF is the complete source code for the Nuand bladeRF USB 3.0 Software Defined Radio, including FX3 USB controller firmware, Cyclone IV FPGA HDL, and the host-side libbladeRF library with bladeRF-cli utility. It provides the drivers, libraries, and tools needed to program and interact with bladeRF SDR hardware from host applications.

## Use cases
- control a bladeRF software defined radio from Linux, Windows, or macOS
- build custom SDR applications using the libbladeRF C library
- flash firmware and load FPGA images onto a bladeRF device
- interact with an SDR from the command line with bladeRF-cli
- integrate SDR transmit and receive into MATLAB or Simulink
- build and modify the FX3 USB controller firmware or FPGA HDL
- run an FSK modem link between two bladeRF boards

## When to choose
- you own or plan to buy a bladeRF board and need host drivers and libraries
- you want to build custom SDR tooling in C/C++ against a stable API
- you need to update firmware, recover a bricked device, or load FPGA images
- you want full source access to firmware, HDL, and host software

## When to avoid
- you use a different SDR such as HackRF, RTL-SDR, or USRP
- you want a ready-made GUI application rather than a library and CLI
- you need a pure-Python or high-level framework without touching C
- you have no bladeRF-compatible hardware

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: active
- function: sdk, cli, embedded, developer-tools
- domain: hardware, embedded-systems, developer-tools
- platform: windows, c, cpp, cross-platform
- tags: sdr, software-defined-radio, fpga, usb-3-0, libbladerf, bladerf-cli, fx3-firmware, hdl, rf, signal-processing, command-line, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- Nuand/bladeRF (main) score 71

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:31.181683+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T04:41:15.082401+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/Nuand/bladeRF (fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:31.181683+00:00, sha 925e815fa299)
  - homepage: http://nuand.com (fetched 2026-08-29T11:58:33.288356+00:00, sha 143eb44d8b75)
  - site_page: https://www.nuand.com/win_installers (fetched 2026-08-29T11:58:33.297537+00:00, sha f7dd564d1153)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.