IoT applications are all around us: indoor, outdoor, and even inside our daily equipment! Need an idea to accomplish a smart garden, irrigation system, or environmental monitoring project? Well, we got you covered. In this article, we will cover the Top IoT applications related to smart agriculture. But first, we might need to consider what we need in order to get it done.

What you need to build IoT applications

Before we dig into the IoT applications you are going to build, first, you might need to consider what you need in order to make it work.

IoT often refers to things that connect to the internet, so obviously, we’ll need something that will allow us to connect to the internet. You could probably use a basic microcontroller and add external WiFi support to it. But a better option would be to use an ESP32-based agriculture IoT kit that has it all in. This will supply you with everything you need to get started. Way easier than looking for separated components and modules all over.

Depending on the application, it might require a different type of sensor. Soil-based applications will need a precise IoT soil moisture sensor, something that STEMinds has to offer! We offer both long and short soil moisture sensors. Suitable for different shapes and sizes of gardens, pots, and plants.

Environmental sensing IoT applications

environmental sensing IoT applications

Environmental monitoring is an easy yet effective way to track the weather and the outside environment. The project can start as easy as basic temperature and humidity sensors and slowly grow to more sensors such as Co2, air quality, gasses detection, and much more. Environmental monitoring is crucial to understand the changes both indoor and outdoor and when IoT comes into play, we can turn our dreams into reality.

Why would you listen to the daily weather podcast if you can build one for yourself? Environmental sensing applications will enable you to monitor the weather over time and share it with your friends and family.

Plants irrigation IoT application

Plants irrigation IoT applications

If you are looking for a simple but interesting IoT project, an irrigation system might be just for you. an automatic IoT water Irrigation system will ensure your plants get the water they need. The system incorporates the use of different types of sensors, such as soil moisture sensors, water pumps, temperature and humidity sensors, and more.

Using an IoT based App or web interface, you can control the irrigation system remotely from anywhere. This is extremely useful when it comes to IoT applications.

Livestock IoT monitoring

IoT applications for livestock

Let’s stop playing and get more serious. Imagine you have a farm and you need to automate some of the agriculture processes to save time and cost or maximize profits, what would you do? One popular application could be IoT Livestock monitoring.

Using different types of sensors, we can monitor the entry and exit of livestock from the farm. Through an AI camera, we can even estimate the size and weight of the farm animal! The need for Livestock is expected to grow over the years, and so is the requirement for IoT automation.

Collecting IoT sensors data for research

IoT research applications

Sometimes we don’t want to automate or perform any particular work. You might be a university student, a researcher, or an innovator. In such a case, data means power!

A cool project would be IoT applications for data collection. Those types of applications don’t perform automate or allow remote control but simply collect data (a lot of it) and enable us to learn more about the environment. There are many IoT applications for research purposes. And it’s important to remember that it all starts with research.

By learning more we can make better decisions and from there move to automation. Sometimes if we have collected enough data, we can run it through a machine learning model that could predict the probability of consequences before they happen. Imagine collecting weather data over years and your AI model will be able to predict what will be the weather tomorrow! That’s what we call taking an IoT application to the next level.

Building your own smart agriculture IoT applications

Agriculture IoT kit

If you are wondering how to get started with building your own agriculture IoT application, you might want to consider going with a kit.

Sometimes, looking for individual components could be quite expensive. Another issue is, that not all components might be suitable for your microcontroller.

STEMinds provides the Eduponics smart agriculture IoT kit – a great way to get started with IoT applications. The hardware includes everything you need such as temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, light intensity sensors, and much more. It comes with a super precise soil moisture sensor that enables you to read your plant moisture data for a long period of time.

The Eduponics agriculture IoT kit is based on the infamous ESP32 microcontroller that has built-in Bluetooth and Wifi, enabling you to create remote-controlled IoT applications with ease!