RE: Do o need ble bootloader separately

Subham — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 16:07:37 GMT

RE: Do o need ble bootloader separately

Priyanka — Mon, 28 Jul 2025 09:53:41 GMT

Hi SHubham,

We have two SDKs - nRF5 SDK (which is the old one) and the nRF Connect SDK (which is the new SDK and recommended for new designs)

In the nRF5SDK the bootloader, the SofDevice and the BLE application are typically flashed separately.

In the nRF Connect SDK, this is based on the Zephyr RTOS so you don't need a separate SoftDevice, i.e. the BLE stack is built-in.

Also here, the Bootloader is based on MCUboot and it comes as part of the build system and you just need to enable it in the config file. So, when you enable MCUboot in your application (CONFIG_BOOTLOADER_MCUBOOT=y), MCUboot is automatically built as a child image, and the system handles the integration.

n other words, you are just doing one build, but internally , the mcuboot is build as a separate image, then your application is being built and then they are combined appropriately.

Please take a look at the following to get a clear undestanding:

https://github.com/hellesvik-nordic/samples_for_nrf_connect_sdk/tree/main/bootloader_samples

https://academy.nordicsemi.com/courses/nrf-connect-sdk-intermediate/lessons/lesson-9-bootloaders-and-dfu-fota/

-Priyanka