ULN2003 Driver

ULN2003 IC is one of the most commonly used Motor driver IC. This IC comes in handy when we need to drive high current loads using digital logic circuits like Op-maps, Timers, Gates, Arduino, PIC, ARM etc. For example a motor that requires 9V and 300mA to run cannot be powered by an Arduino I/O hence we use this IC to source enough current and voltage for the load. This IC is commonly used to drive Relay modules, Motors, high current LEDs and even Stepper Motors. So if you have anything that anything more than 5V 80mA to work, then this IC would be the right choice for you.

The ULN2003is a 16-pin IC. It has seven Darlington Pairs inside, where each can drive loads up to 50V and 500mA. For these seven Darlington Pairs we have seven Input and Output Pins. Adding to that we can a ground and Common pin. The ground pin, as usual is grounded and the usage of Common pin is optional. It might be surprising to note that this IC does not have any Vcc (power) pin; this is because the power required for the transistors to work will be drawn from the input pin itself.