Device Partition Explorer

[中文]

Device Partition Explorer lists the flash layout of the current ESP-IDF project. From a partition row you can read that region from the connected device, flash a binary to its offset, or open it in the Filesystem Image Explorer.

This view is separate from the Partition Table Editor, which edits the project’s partition table CSV, then builds and flashes that table.

Where to find it

Open ESP-IDF Explorer in the activity bar. Device Partition Explorer starts collapsed. Its title bar has two commands:

  • ESP-IDF: Refresh Partition Table

  • ESP-IDF: Open Partition Table Editor UI

Before you refresh

Select the device serial port with ESP-IDF: Select Port to Use. Configure the extension as described in Install ESP-IDF and Tools.

Build the project first. Refresh uses these build outputs:

  • build/flasher_args.json

  • build/bootloader/bootloader.bin

  • build/partition_table/partition-table.bin

How the list is built

ESP-IDF: Refresh Partition Table (espIdf.partition.table.refresh) does not read the partition table stored on the chip. It converts the built partition-table.bin with ESP-IDF components/partition_table/gen_esp32part.py, using the partition table offset from flasher_args.json, and writes partition_table/partitionTable.csv in the project folder.

The tree then shows:

  • bootloader, at the bootloader address from flasher_args.json, sized from bootloader.bin

  • partition_table, at the partition table address, shown as 3K

  • each partition from the generated CSV

Each row shows the name, offset, and size. The tooltip is the type and subtype, for example data / spiffs.

Partition actions

Click a row and choose an action. The selected serial port is used for read and flash.

  • Read partition from device runs esptool.py read_flash for that offset and size and saves partitionsFromDevice/<name>.bin in the project folder.

  • Flash binary to this partition asks for a .bin file and runs esptool.py write_flash at that partition’s offset.

  • Explore filesystem is offered only for data partitions. It opens the Filesystem Image Explorer. If partitionsFromDevice/<name>.bin is not on disk yet, the extension reads the partition from the device. If that file already exists, choose Read again from device or Use cached binary. Refresh Filesystem Image re-parses the opened file and does not read the chip.

Flash a binary from the file explorer

Right-click a .bin file and choose ESP-IDF: Flash Binary to Partition... (espIdf.flashBinaryToPartition). Pick a partition from the list already loaded in Device Partition Explorer, or choose Custom offset and enter a hexadecimal value such as 0x110000 or a decimal offset.

Refresh the partition list first if you want the project’s partitions in that picker. Custom offset remains available when the list is empty.

Messages for these commands are written to the Partition Table output channel.