* Quick start for new developers - hook up your LEDs and go, no need to think about specifics of the LED chipsets being used
* Zero pain switching LED chipsets - you get some new LEDs that the library supports, just change the definition of LEDs you're using, et. voila! Your code is running with the new LEDs.
* High performance - with features like zero cost global brightness scaling, high performance 8-bit math for RGB manipulation, and some of the fastest bit-bang'd SPI support around, FastLED wants to keep as many CPU cycles available for your LED patterns as possible
Install the library using either [the .zip file from the latest release](https://github.com/FastLED/FastLED/releases/latest/) or by searching for "FastLED" in the libraries manager of the Arduino IDE. [See the Arduino documentation on how to install libraries for more information.](https://docs.arduino.cc/software/ide-v1/tutorials/installing-libraries)
If you need help with using the library, please consider visiting the Reddit community at https://reddit.com/r/FastLED. There are thousands of knowledgeable FastLED users in that group and a plethora of solutions in the post history.
If you are looking for documentation on how something in the library works, please see the Doxygen documentation online at http://fastled.io/docs.
If you run into bugs with the library, or if you'd like to request support for a particular platform or LED chipset, please submit an issue at http://fastled.io/issues.
Here's a list of all the LED chipsets are supported. More details on the LED chipsets are included [on our wiki page](https://github.com/FastLED/FastLED/wiki/Chipset-reference)
* Adafruit's DotStars - aka APA102
* Adafruit's Neopixel - aka WS2812B (also WS2811/WS2812/WS2813, also supported in lo-speed mode) - a 3 wire addressable LED chipset
HL1606, and "595"-style shift registers are no longer supported by the library. The older Version 1 of the library ("FastSPI_LED") has support for these, but is missing many of the advanced features of current versions and is no longer being maintained.
Right now the library is supported on a variety of Arduino compatible platforms. If it's ARM or AVR and uses the Arduino software (or a modified version of it to build) then it is likely supported. Note that we have a long list of upcoming platforms to support, so if you don't see what you're looking for here, ask, it may be on the roadmap (or may already be supported). N.B. at the moment we are only supporting the stock compilers that ship with the Arduino software. Support for upgraded compilers, as well as using AVR Studio and skipping the Arduino entirely, should be coming in a near future release.
* Teensy 2, Teensy++ 2, Teensy 3.0, Teensy 3.1/3.2, Teensy LC, Teensy 3.5, Teensy 3.6, and Teensy 4.0 - Arduino compatible from pjrc.com with some extra goodies (note the Teensy LC, 3.2, 3.5, 3.6, 4.0 are ARM, not AVR!)
* ESP8266 using the Arduino board definitions from http://arduino.esp8266.com/stable/package_esp8266com_index.json - please be sure to also read https://github.com/FastLED/FastLED/wiki/ESP8266-notes for information specific to the 8266.
Wait, what happened to FastSPI_LED and FastSPI_LED2? The library was initially named FastSPI_LED because it was focused on very fast and efficient SPI access. However, since then, the library has expanded to support a number of LED chipsets that don't use SPI, as well as a number of math and utility functions for LED processing across the board. We decided that the name FastLED more accurately represents the totality of what the library provides, everything fast, for LEDs.