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Nordic Semiconductor

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Wireless SoCs for Bluetooth Low Energy, Thread, Zigbee, Matter and low-power cellular IoT.

Headquarters: Trondheim, Norway Founded 1983 1001-5000 employees Details verified October 17, 2026 Updated October 17, 2026

Nordic Semiconductor designs the radio chips found in a large share of Bluetooth Low Energy products, from fitness trackers and keyboards to medical sensors. Its nRF52, nRF53 and newer nRF54L families combine an Arm Cortex-M core with a 2.4 GHz radio that supports Bluetooth LE, Thread and Zigbee, which makes them a common choice for Matter devices. The nRF91 series, now led by the nRF9151, adds LTE-M and NB-IoT cellular connectivity with GNSS in a single system-in-package aimed at asset trackers and meters, and the nRF70 series adds Wi-Fi as a companion chip.

The company ships the nRF Connect SDK, built on the Zephyr real-time operating system, and publishes its reference designs and tooling on GitHub. The nRF Cloud service covers device management, location and observability with a free tier for prototypes. For product teams the trade-off is typical of a silicon vendor with a strong ecosystem: thorough documentation and community, in exchange for a toolchain that is tied to Nordic parts.

Main products

  • nRF52 series
  • nRF53 series
  • nRF54L series
  • nRF91 series
  • nRF70 series
  • nPM power management ICs
  • nRF Connect SDK
  • nRF Cloud

Pricing model

Chips and development kits are sold through authorised distributors listed in Nordic's distributor finder; nordicsemi.com publishes no unit prices. nRF Connect SDK is a free download. nRF Cloud has a free Developer plan (up to 10 devices, non-production use), a Pro plan from $0.10 per device per month plus usage fees, and an Enterprise plan on quote. Official pricing page.

Known limits

  • nRF Connect SDK mixes open-source Zephyr with Nordic proprietary software and supports Nordic devices only
  • The free nRF Cloud Developer plan is capped at 10 devices and non-production use
  • Chip prices are not published; quotes come from distributors or regional sales

Alternatives in the directory

  • Silicon Labs: Wireless SoCs and modules for Bluetooth, Zigbee, Thread, Matter, Wi-SUN and proprietary radio
  • Espressif Systems: Maker of the ESP32 family of Wi-Fi and Bluetooth microcontrollers used across consumer and industrial IoT.
  • STMicroelectronics: STM32 microcontrollers, MEMS sensors and secure chips for industrial and consumer IoT

Products, pricing and limits checked against the company's official site on October 17, 2026. Prices and plans change; the official page is the reference. Spotted an error? Tell us or see the editorial policy.

Focus: bluetooth le socs, cellular iot modules.

Tags: bluetooth le · thread · zigbee · matter · lte-m · nb-iot

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