2.3. Download Remote Libraries

Before you can start with creating new projects, you need to add some libraries to your Workspace. Libraries contain various kinds of elements which can be added to schematics and boards (e.g. symbols and footprints).

To open the Library Manager, click on the corresponding button in the Control Panel (or on the link in the shown warning, but the warning will disappear after you add a library):

Library Manager

The Library Manager directly fetches the list of available libraries from the Internet. Most of these libraries are hosted at https://github.com/LibrePCB-Libraries.

The provided libraries currently contain only a few elements. You are welcome to contribute more elements by opening pull requests at https://github.com/LibrePCB-Libraries!

The most important library is the LibrePCB Base library because it contains the most commonly used library elements (like resistors or diodes). It is highly recommended to install this library. To do so, just select the checkboxes at the right and click on the Download and install/update all selected libraries button:

Download Libraries

By the way, the same way you can also update already installed libraries to the latest version. You should regularly update all libraries to get more elements and bugfixes/improvements of existing elements.

Dependencies between different libraries are automatically taken into account when changing the selection. So for example if you select LibrePCB Connectors, the LibrePCB Base Library will automatically be selected too because the Connectors library depends on it.

Downloaded (so-called remote-) libraries are always read-only because otherwise local modifications could cause conflicts when updating the library the next time. But this should not be an issue, just follow the guide below to create your own local library. In a local library you can extend, or even overwrite existing library elements (by using a higher version number to enforce higher priority).

If you are familiar with Version Control Systems (e.g. Git) and want to use them to manage your libraries (instead of the Library Manager), just clone the libraries into the subdirectory v0.1/libraries/local/ in your Workspace.