I2C

Science & Engineering abbreviation · Electronics & Electrical

I2C
Stands forInter-Integrated Circuit
CategoriesScience & Engineering

I2C stands for Inter-Integrated Circuit, an electronics & electrical abbreviation.

Two-wire serial bus, using a data line (SDA) and clock line (SCL), that lets a microcontroller talk to many chips such as sensors, real-time clocks, EEPROMs and small displays, each identified by an address. It is slower than SPI but needs only two wires for many devices.

Example: The temperature sensor sits at I2C address 0x48 on the same bus as the clock chip.

Usage notes

Philips Semiconductors (now NXP) introduced I2C in 1982. Standard mode runs at 100 kHz and fast mode at 400 kHz. Pronounced "I-squared-C" and sometimes written I²C or IIC. Related buses include SMBus in PCs and the DDC channel that monitors use to report their capabilities over HDMI and DisplayPort.

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