Bosch BMI160 6-axis IMU (accelerometer + gyroscope)
A small, low-power 6-axis inertial measurement unit from Bosch Sensortec that combines a 3-axis accelerometer and 3-axis gyroscope on an I2C or SPI bus. It was widely used from the mid-2010s onward in smartphones, wearables, fitness trackers, and hobbyist boards for motion and orientation sensing.
recommendation
Worth keeping but flagged as legacy because the silicon itself is now marked obsolete at major distributors like Mouser and DigiKey, even though Bosch still lists the part and breakout boards remain on sale at retailers like DFRobot. Upstream is clearly still maintaining the code, with a real bug fix landing in March 2026 and being backported to stable, so there is no case for removal — just an honest note that this is declining hardware with modest current deployment.
repository signals
sources
- lore.kernel.org
As of March 10, 2026 the driver still receives targeted upstream fixes rather than removal work ('Remove potential undefined behavior in bmi160_config_pin()').
- lore.kernel.org
The March 2026 bmi160 fix was picked into stable, indicating ongoing maintenance for deployed systems.
- bosch-sensortec.com
Bosch still publishes the BMI160 product page and positions it as a 6-axis IMU for mobile and wearable use cases.
- mouser.com
A major distributor lists BMI160 lifecycle status as obsolete, indicating the silicon is no longer a current-growth part.
- digikey.com
DigiKey lists BMI160 part status as obsolete / no longer manufactured.
- dfrobot.com
BMI160-based sensor modules are still sold as new retail hardware, supporting continued low-level hobbyist/embedded deployment.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
`exec_command` showed this is a real I2C/SPI Bosch BMI160 IIO driver. `lore_file_timeline` returned fresh 2026 activity and stable backports; the cited lore URLs came from that tool. `web.search_query` returned the Bosch, Mouser, DigiKey, and DFRobot URLs. Net: silicon family is obsolete at major distributors, but boards/modules remain on sale and upstream still fixes bugs, so removal is not justified; keep it but annotate as legacy/declining hardware with low current deployment.