Raspberry Pi Foundation new RP2040 microcontroller and Raspberry Pi 5 Compute Module releases in 2024

Raspberry Pi Foundation co-founder Eben Upton has outlined plans for two future single-board computers (SBCs). While the Foundation has not announced anything itself, Upton's statements at the Cambridge Raspberry Jam should be treated as official confirmation rather than conjecture. For context, little over a month has passed since the Foundation launched the Raspberry Pi 5, replacing the four-year-old Raspberry Pi 4 Model B.

According to Upton, the Foundation hopes to now manufacture up to 40,000 Raspberry Pi units per day, of which 10,000 are dedicated to the Raspberry Pi 5. Unfortunately, the Foundation's latest SBC still remains difficult to obtain. At the time of writing, most distributors are waiting on new batches to arrive with a view to shipping more units next month.

Nonetheless, Upton has confirmed that the Foundation intends to replace the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4 (curr. US$79 on Amazon) next year with a corresponding fifth-generation model. Although Upton did not clarify when either device would be available, he also hinted that the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5 would provide 'USB 3.0 where some of the MIPI lane[s] used to be' in its predecessor while maintaining 'a high degree of commonality'. Moreover, it has been developing a successor to the RP2040, which Upton implied will sport a more powerful architecture, additional RAM and an improved General-Purpose Input/Output (GPIO) offering.