In my hobby projects, I tend to use the AVR line. Starting from ATMega328p over a decade ago, the AVR line has always had a special place in my hobby toolbox.

Browsing a bit on Microchip's blog, I discovered that the a new line of chips, the AVR LA, was announced this month (June 2026). This surprisingly continues the tradition of 8-bit microcontrollers into the year of 2026.

Looking over the specs sheet, it seems like Microchip is really selling this as a Capacitive Touch controller, with improvements against noise?? (Something about a driven shield + extra boost? Maybe a voltage boost for faster touch sensing?)

I don't fully understand the capacitive touch side, but its something that Microchip has often included in various AVR chips.

The other tidbits I've noticed is how much weaker / cheaper the specs seem to be compared to AVR DD or AVR EB released in the past 5 years. 10-bit ADC (instead of 12-bit on the DD). Fewer comparators. No "special features" (AVR DB had op-amps as part of the package. AVR EA had programmable-gain differential ADC capable of detecting differences of just a dozen microvolts of change....)

AVR LA however? Seemingly all focused on capacitive-touch features. Maybe someone in this topic can talk if this "driven shield" thing is worth all the effort.

That being said: the AVR LA seems to come in at a significantly lower cost, closer to the 50-cents @5k price point.

There's a few misc changes. "TimerA" (which has been present for years) seems to have been completely replaced by "TimerE". Capabilities wise that's fine, TimerE seems better than TimerA in all ways I can think of... but anyone who built code on the older timer might have some code rewriting before they can use this new chip.

Finally, 1.62V is a few hundredths of a volt lower than previous specs (of 1.8V from earlier models). Someone out there probably is excited about ever so slightly better battery lives from this.