Best online circuit simulators for students

There is no single best circuit simulator. A first-year student checking a voltage divider, a maker testing an ESP32 sketch and an engineer sizing a filter need different tools. This guide compares the simulators students actually use, says what each one is good at and where it stops, and was checked against each tool’s own website on 6 November 2026. We make Simscuit, so we have tried to be as fair to the others as to ourselves.

Open Circuit Studio free

Four questions to ask before you choose

What are you simulating? Analogue circuits (filters, amplifiers, power supplies) need a SPICE-class engine. Microcontroller projects need something that runs your code against the circuit.
How exact must it be? Teaching tools trade precision for clarity and speed. Design tools give waveforms you can measure, but ask for more set-up.
Where will you use it? A browser tool works on a school Chromebook or a phone. Desktop tools need a Windows, macOS or Linux computer and an installation.
What happens next? If the project will become a printed circuit board or an enclosure, a tool that carries the design forward saves redrawing it.

At a glance

Circuit simulators for students compared, checked 6 November 2026
Tool	Best for	Price	Runs on	How it simulates
Simscuit	The whole project: breadboard, Arduino code on about 20 boards, PCB, 3D enclosure, robots and courses	Free to start; paid plans	Browser, Chromebooks, installable app that works offline	Solves voltages and currents; sketches run in its own Arduino interpreter
Tinkercad Circuits	First lessons, younger students, block coding	Free	Browser	Circuit and Arduino or micro:bit simulation
Wokwi	Arduino, ESP32, STM32 and Pico firmware	Free for personal use; paid plans	Browser, VS Code	Runs compiled firmware on a simulated microcontroller
Falstad (CircuitJS)	Seeing how analogue and digital circuits behave	Free, open source	Browser, offline versions	Animated real-time circuit simulation
EveryCircuit	Animated circuits on a phone or tablet	Free with limits; paid	Browser, Android, iOS	Real-time interactive simulation
EasyEDA	Schematics and PCBs with SPICE checks	Free	Browser, desktop	ngspice (Standard edition)
LTspice	Accurate analogue and power simulation	Free	Windows, macOS	SPICE
KiCad	Schematic, PCB and SPICE in one free suite	Free, open source	Windows, macOS, Linux	ngspice, built into the schematic editor

Simscuit

Simscuit is the one tool on this list that takes a student from a breadboard to a finished project in a single browser tab. You build a circuit on a virtual breadboard from more than 1,000 components drawn at real size, each spec linked to its datasheet source, write an Arduino sketch and press Run Simulation. It works out the voltages and currents in the circuit, lights LEDs, turns motors and servos, and lets you hover over any pin or wire to read it. Parts pushed past the limits in their datasheet records glow, smoke and burn out, and the Problems panel shows the exact figure that was exceeded.

Sketches run on about 20 simulated boards, each with its own pin rules: the Arduino Uno, Uno R4 WiFi, Nano, Mega, Leonardo and Due, the ESP32 DevKit, ESP32-S3, Nano ESP32, XIAO ESP32C3 and NodeMCU ESP8266, the Raspberry Pi Pico W and XIAO RP2040, STM32 Nucleo and Blue Pill, Teensy 4.1, micro:bit and Circuit Playground Express among them. A multimeter, two-channel oscilloscope, logic analyser, function generator and bench supply sit on the canvas and can be adjusted while it runs.

Then the same project keeps going: a two-layer PCB with Gerber X2, Excellon, BOM, pick-and-place and KiCad 7 exports (checked with an independent Gerber reader and in KiCad 7), a 3D-printable enclosure in parametric CAD, a robot with real physics programmed by the same kind of sketch, or a phone app that talks to the board. Python courses run real CPython and C++ courses compile with real Clang, in the browser. It is free to start, runs on Chromebooks and works offline once installed.

The limits, stated plainly: sketches run in Simscuit’s own Arduino interpreter, which covers the common Arduino functions and a documented list of libraries but not interrupts, classes, structs or pointers; Wi-Fi is not simulated; parts without a simulation model are marked Visual only; and there is no SPICE engine to drive directly, so precise analogue design belongs in a SPICE tool.

Best for students, teachers and makers who want breadboard practice, Arduino code and the rest of the project in one place.

Tinkercad Circuits

Tinkercad, from Autodesk, describes itself as a free web app for 3D design, electronics and coding. In Circuits you drag components onto a canvas, wire them and start the simulation; Arduino and micro:bit boards are programmed with blocks, blocks with the matching text side by side, or text alone (C++ for Arduino, Python for micro:bit). Starter circuits, guided lessons, Tinkercad Classrooms for teachers and kidSAFE COPPA certification make it a common choice in schools.

Limits to know: the Arduino text editor offers a set of built-in libraries, and Tinkercad’s own help says libraries for hardware it does not include will not work. Designs are private until made public. Its three editors are 3D Design, Circuits and Codeblocks; PCB layout is not among them.

Simscuit vs Tinkercad Circuits, in detail

Wokwi

Wokwi simulates Arduino (Uno, Nano, Mega, ATtiny85), many ESP32 chips, several STM32 parts and the Raspberry Pi Pico family. It runs the compiled firmware on a simulated microcontroller, so Arduino code, MicroPython, CircuitPython, Rust and ESP-IDF projects all work, and you can load your own .bin, .elf or .uf2 file. It simulates ESP32 Wi-Fi (MQTT, HTTP, NTP), has a virtual logic analyser, GDB debugging, a VS Code extension and CI support.

It is free for personal use, with paid Hobby, Hobby+ and Pro plans. Its documentation lists Bluetooth as not implemented on the ESP32 family, and PCB layout and SPICE-style analogue analysis are not among the features it describes.

Simscuit vs Wokwi, in detail

Falstad circuit simulator (CircuitJS)

Paul Falstad’s simulator, ported to JavaScript as CircuitJS, draws a schematic and animates it: green and red for voltage, moving dots for current. It has hundreds of example circuits, from Ohm’s law and RC filters to op-amps, 555 timers, logic families and power converters, and you can change values while it runs. It is free, open source, runs in the browser and has offline versions.

It is excellent for building intuition. It is a schematic tool rather than a breadboard, and it is not designed for running Arduino sketches (there is a separate AVR8js experiment on the site).

EveryCircuit

EveryCircuit animates voltages, currents and charges on top of the schematic, with an oscilloscope, I-V curves and AC analysis with Bode plots. It runs online and as Android and iOS apps, which makes it a good pocket simulator. The free version lets you simulate your own circuits of up to 5 components, and public circuits of any size; a subscription or one-time purchase unlocks the rest, and educators can buy class licences.

EasyEDA

EasyEDA is a free schematic and PCB design tool that runs in the browser, with a desktop client that can work offline. Its Standard edition simulates circuits with ngspice, the open-source SPICE engine, and its documentation explains how to bring in third-party SPICE models. It is a strong choice when you want a schematic, a simulation and a board order in one place; as a SPICE-based simulator it works on circuits, and its documentation does not describe running microcontroller code.

LTspice

LTspice, from Analog Devices, is a free SPICE simulator with schematic capture and a waveform viewer, for Windows and macOS. It is the reference choice for analogue and switching power circuits: transient, AC and noise analyses, and a large library of models and demo circuits. It is desktop software with a steeper learning curve, and as a SPICE simulator it does not run microcontroller firmware.

KiCad

KiCad is a free, open-source suite (GNU GPL v3) for schematic capture and PCB layout on Windows, macOS and Linux, with Gerber output. Its schematic editor has an ngspice simulator built in, so a student can draw, simulate and lay out a board without paying for anything. Like LTspice, it is a desktop tool for analogue and digital circuits, not code.

The tools an engineering student needs

A note on Multisim Live

Many older lists recommend NI Multisim Live. Digilent and NI announced that it reached end of life on 15 September 2026 and is no longer available; NI now points users to the desktop Multisim in its Circuit Design Suite.

Which one should you pick?

Most engineers end up using two: one for code and quick checks, and a SPICE tool for analogue work. That is normal, not a failure to choose.

Breadboard practice and Arduino code that then become a PCB, an enclosure, a robot or an app, on almost any board, in one tool: Simscuit.
Your first circuits with block coding, or a class of younger students: Tinkercad Circuits.
Seeing why a circuit behaves as it does: Falstad, or EveryCircuit on a phone.
Arduino or ESP32 code that must match the real chip, Wi-Fi included: Wokwi.
Accurate analogue or power design: LTspice, or KiCad’s ngspice simulator.
Schematic and PCB with simulation in the browser: EasyEDA.

Sources

Checked 6 November 2026. Prices and features change; follow the links for the current details.

Questions

What is the best free circuit simulator?

For analogue accuracy, LTspice or KiCad’s ngspice simulator, both free. For learning in a browser, Tinkercad Circuits, Falstad or Simscuit. For microcontroller firmware, Wokwi is free for personal use.

Can a browser simulator replace SPICE?

For learning and for most Arduino projects, yes. For precise analogue, RF or power design, use a SPICE tool such as LTspice, ngspice or KiCad’s simulator and check against the datasheet.