ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Esten — Fri, 29 Aug 2025 02:38:00 GMT

Got it! Thanks again.

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Hung Bui — Thu, 28 Aug 2025 08:00:39 GMT

Hi Esten,
Yes it's in the pipeline. I can't tell about the exact date it will be available but we are aiming to have the sample in next release of NCS SDK.

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Esten — Thu, 28 Aug 2025 05:19:58 GMT

Hi Hung,
Thank you for your information.
It looks like that there are no other better solutions avaiable at this point. Is there any detailed plan for supporting concurrent ESB+BLE in future?

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Hung Bui — Wed, 27 Aug 2025 10:28:31 GMT

Hi Esten,
I quote the feedback from our developer here:

I think what the customer encountered while working with concurrent BLE + ESB is sort of expected. The ESB, due to it's fully asynchronous nature was never designed to operate contiguously with other protocols. I know that some customers make the ESB transmitter side work along BLE, and the issues they have, they fix with some workarounds like the customer mentioned here. We are planning to add support for concurrent BLE + ESB at some point, and will resolve these things properly then.

Regarding the ESB code not fitting well in the Timeslot API -it is like that because it was never designed to be used that way. The Radio event handling including the usage of shorts and PPIs is a bit complex in ESB to achieve the lowest possible latency, so there might be some impact on the operation in timeslot if the configs are not cleared well in some configurations e.g. CONFIG_NEVER_DISABLE_TX. I think the workaround they use with calling the ESB radio event handler from in the timeslot event is ok to use for now. Regarding the PPI issue - it needs additional analysis from our side.

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Esten — Tue, 26 Aug 2025 01:19:03 GMT

Okay. Thank you for your information. I would be happy to hear any update .

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Hung Bui — Thu, 21 Aug 2025 13:35:56 GMT

Hi Esten,
I have sent your request internally. I will come back when I have a feedback from the team.

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Esten — Wed, 20 Aug 2025 03:33:18 GMT

Hi Hung,
Yes, concurrent ESB + BLE can work perfectly in our nrf54L projects right now, the advertising / connection of BLE works when ESB receives or transmits at the same time.

I have alreay read this thread and it can answer the issue1 above. About issue1, I don't have any more questions about it. Just like I said, another hardware timer can work at this point but with flaws.

About issue2 and issue3, I want to hear the professional suggestions from Nordic, especially issue 3. I need to know if your team can make esb + ble work together without changing source codes like i have done.

RE: ESB and BLE concurrent issues on nRF54L series

Hung Bui — Tue, 19 Aug 2025 14:51:44 GMT

Hi Esten,

You pretty much sum up the issues with concurrent ESB + BLE. I just want to clarify that now you have a prototype that works ? with ESB + BLE concurrent ?

I assume you have read this thread ? RE: MPSL ESB and BLE timer problem.
Following is the list of issue that my coworker who worked on this provided me:

timer in radio domain is used by mpsl
dppi hardcoded, no ppib
no logic for adding more timers
gppi, which sets up ppib for you, cannot be used, as there is no concept of "nrfx_gppi group" in the scope of nRF54L.

As far as I know our R&D team is working on this and we are hoping to have a prototype by the next release of the SDK in a couple of month.