Why We Choose Rust for IoT Projects

January 2026 • 8 min read

When we started building IoT devices at Creworker, we used C like everyone else. After two years of production deployments and countless debugging sessions, we've transitioned to Rust as our primary language for embedded systems. Here's why.

The Problem with C in 2026

C has been the lingua franca of embedded systems for decades. It's fast, it's low-level, and every microcontroller has a C compiler. But it comes with significant costs.

We've spent more time than we'd like to admit debugging:

Buffer overflows that only manifest in production
Use-after-free bugs that crash devices weeks after deployment
Race conditions in interrupt handlers
Memory leaks that slowly degrade performance

These aren't hypothetical problems. They're real bugs we've shipped, debugged, and fixed - often at significant cost to our clients and our reputation.

Enter Rust

Rust's ownership system catches these bugs at compile time. The same performance as C, but with memory safety guarantees that make buffer overflows and use-after-free bugs impossible.

Key Benefits We've Experienced

Zero memory bugs in production: Not a single memory safety issue since switching
Confident refactoring: The compiler catches breaking changes
Better code quality: Rust's type system encourages good design
Modern tooling: Cargo, rust-analyzer, and excellent documentation

The Ecosystem Has Matured

Two years ago, embedded Rust was experimental. Today, we have:

ESP-RS: Excellent support for ESP32 chips
Embassy: Async runtime for embedded systems
probe-rs: Modern debugging tools
defmt: Efficient logging for constrained devices

The tooling is now good enough that we're more productive in Rust than we were in C.

When We Still Use C

We're pragmatic, not dogmatic. We still use C when:

The client's existing codebase is in C
The target MCU doesn't have good Rust support
Time pressure requires using existing C libraries

But for new projects where we have a choice, Rust is our default.

Getting Started

If you're considering Rust for your next embedded project, we recommend:

Start with the Embedded Rust Book
Try a simple project on an ESP32 or STM32
Join the Rust Embedded working group community

The learning curve is real, but the payoff is worth it.

Interested in discussing your IoT project? Get in touch.