homeassistant

Mostly 3d printed stuff but there are dozens of cases on Aliexpress.

I'm using project boxes from Amazon, like these: https://a.co/d/4R4Dtv5 before I had a 3d printer to make something bespoke. Some of the boxes have the ESP board glued down, some it’s loose. It works well enough and doesn’t look too bad. I still use them now as it’s easier to throw everything into a box instead of designing something specific to the project.

Openscad, just because..

https://www.printables.com/model/73924-esp32-devkit-v4-case-openscad

Probably convenient to have access to an 3D printer

Man I thought this was going to be some philosophical thing suggesting that esp32 could be replaced with something else!

I 3D print up a custom one, sized for each project.

I ran into the same with the "D1 Mini". The few cases available were expensive for what they were and not a great fit for my needs.

If you have access to a 3D printer, there are some pretty good models on thingiverse and printables. But YMMV depending on which board you're using.

Another possiblity... I wanted to permanently put one in my car, so having some basic protection with the least amount of bulk was important. I ended up buying some shrink tube large enough to go around the entire board (IIRC it was 40mm, 2:1 shrink ratio), got everything wired up, slid the tubing over and shrunk it down. Could probably "double wrap" for more complete coverage. Again, this is board dependent and worked well for the D1 since it doesn't have pre-soldered pins.

Cheers!

Generic plastic project boxes work well, or for outdoor use a waterproof electrical junction box.

It's probably a bit late for a new ESP32, but if not I'm a fan of the M5Stack Atom Lite. It's a solid little device and comes in its own case.