Plugable Digital Microscope with Flexible Arm Obse
$44.95
Price: $44.95
(as of Feb 27, 2025 13:45:22 UTC – Details)
From the brand
At Plugable, we design products for productivity. And we know that work can happen anywhere–at a desk, on the road, in an office, and more often than ever, at home.
Every Plugable product–from dongle to docking station–is designed and tested by our team in Redmond, Washington to work anywhere you work.
Browse Our Cable Collection
Browse Our Dock Collection
Browse Our Hub Collection
Browse Our Adapter Collection
Browse Data Storage Collection
Browse Our USB Accessories
Browse Our Power Devices
Browse New Product Releases
Hobby Focused: Explore the microscopic world with ease; ideal for students, collectors, and testers. Use as an electronics microscope, soldering microscope, USB coin microscope, and more. Capture single images, time-lapse, and video.
Perfect for Grab and Go Examination: Convenient for laptop, tablet, or desktop use. Includes flexible arm stand and observation pad for measurements or handheld use.
Broad compatibility: Utilizes a webcam chipset and sensor for seamless operation with most operating systems. Connects via USB and USB-C/Thunderbolt ports. Requires ChromeOS 108 or above.
High Definition Microscope with Built-in Lighting: 2.0 Megapixels, 60x to 250x magnification. LED halo light with adjustable brightness. Offers 7000K color temperature and 0-38 lumen for optimal clarity.
Unlock the Microscopic World: Discover hidden details in everyday objects; perfect for educational purposes, hobbyists, and professionals seeking precision in their work.
ChemSciGuy –
Great microscope with features not all others offer
I’ve tried a handful of USB microscopes and this one is the best so far. Two things warrant mention. The first is the camera adjustments available under Windows and the other is resolution. The Plugable software (Windows version is all I’ve used), which requires download, can be set to auto adjust brightness but it can be manually adjusted too. My application requires locking exposure and this microscope can do it. That isn’t the case for the other microscopes I’ve tested. It also isn’t a feature mentioned by manufacturers. For my application, autoranging is undesirable. The ability to control exposure makes this scope stand out and why I like it so much. I am baffled by the magnification numbers given by manufacturers. This scope gives equal or higher magnification compared to others claiming 1600X. To change magnification, the scope is positioned above an object and focused. There is no zoom. All the others I’ve tried operate the same way. I’ve enclosed results at distances of 0, 20 and 40 mm from the clear plastic guard showing a 1 mm scale. I’ve also shown a penny’s date at 0 and 40 mm. A penny is nominally 19 mm with 1 in the date being about 1.17mm or so. While the scope is great, I am not a fan of the flexible mount when operating at maximum magnification. Touching the microscope to focus or adjust lighting causes annoying movement. It is easy to get in a seemingly endless loop of adjust, move the object, readjust. I have a more rigid stand and find it to be far easier to use due both to rigidity and gears to move the microscope up and down. Circling back to software control, the camera app native to Windows can be used with add-on setting apps to set exposure and other options. Other USB microscopes have most of these setting greyed out whether in the Windows settings or in the apps supplied. They just aren’t available.. I find the Plugable app does everything I want to do and does it quite nicely. Still pictures, videos and time-lapse are all available.
Andrew –
One of the most surprisingly good purchases I’ve made on Amazon
Hands down, this is one of the most surprising buys I’ve ever had on Amazon. I don’t think I’ve ever bought any product off of Amazon with as low an expectation (so many cheap electronics!) and been as happy as I am with this little microscope.I’ve had this for over six months now, and still love it. I can only vouch for using it on a Mac, but it’s plug-and-play as far as I can tell without a problem, ever. Image quality is fantastic, it’s easy to use, has great depth of field, and takes great pictures. The integrated light source is awesome too, very bright and adjustable so you can light up a surface and see defects and small details with high contrast. I’m an engineer and use it for taking pictures of small mechanical parts, and this scope cannot be beat for the price. The main reason I’ve been so pleased and surprised is that I’ve used a $30,000 microscope (one of the best digital microscopes in the world) and it was not much better at the magnifications I’m using it for. Best of all I don’t have to worry at all about breaking this one because it’s so cheap. Even then, I’ve beat this thing up in the field looking at aerospace components, and it is holding up like a champ. The only warning, it only operates at 10x and 250x magnification as far as I can tell, so not many options for magnification in between, but otherwise, it’s great.If you’re doing industrial machining and grinding, quality control on electronics, you’re a hobbyist, a teacher, or you just want to see little stuff big, this is the scope for you. You know how everyone used to have those little science kits with a microscope that was impossible to see anything through? This is the exact opposite of that, and if you have any scientific curiosity at all, or you’re a professional of some sort who needs a microscope, you should own this. Just buy it, who knew that looking at your hair or the dust in your vacuum was this fascinating?
Greg –
Great microscope, but has software issues.
This is a great little microscope for the price. I purchased it to use for my coin collecting hobby and it really brings things and details up close. I also got to playing around with it and looked at some other things up close. I had no idea that my gray hair was transparent!!!! hahaha!!!! Seriously, it is! I could see the background through my piece of gray hair….. Ok, back to the review. The scope is well built and very sturdy. Two things that I had issues with (actually one thing was not really an issue, but more like a recommendation to the manufacturer) were the length of the flexible “pole” (it is actually metal and very well built) and then there was an issue with downloading the required software for it to run on my MacBook Pro.1- I would highly recommend the manufacturer supply a longer pole so that the scope is further away from the object you are viewing. I cannot get a full picture of even a penny in one frame. I will address this by extending the pole or building a longer tower in order to overcome this one issue.2- Even though the product description says it is compatible with MacOS, the software would not install onto my MacBook Pro no matter what I did. I was slightly frustrated with this obviously, but after researching the issue, I found that a program called Photo Booth, already installed on my computer, thankfully allowed the camera to work. The Plugable software would download, but it just would not install and I kept getting error issues. Oh well….. I think the manufacturer needs to also address this issue as well.Overall, I would recommend this scope to anyone on a budget. I got the 250x model and cannot imagine what a higher powered model would be capable of doing!!!! 250x is plenty enough magnification for almost any application I would think. At least it is for me and my coin collecting hobby. Hope this helps.
GS –
This digital microscope is really great! I use it on Linux Debian 10 (64 bit). No installation need it, Linux recognise this cam right a way on both free and non-free Debian. I guess it will work with all debian based distros like Mint or Ubuntu. Just plug it in and start cheese app to view. Touch button for taking photos works very well too.The leg with suction cup is no joke, its really sturdy and holds cam really still. I am really happy with my purchase and its well worth of £40. Primary use is for computer chips and repairs. Resolution this cam can provide you with focus is absolutely fantastic!I did not test it on Chrome OS or android yet as I was not in need yet.
mmazon –
Für meine Abschlussarbeit habe ich ein tragbares, handliches Mikroskop gebraucht das eine genügend hohe Vergrößerung hervorbringt.Dieses Mikroskop ist für seinen Preis sehr gut. Natürlich kann man es nicht mit einem Labormikroskop vergleichen, mit älteren, kleinen, Labormikroskopen kann es aber durchaus mithalten. Die Bildqualität ist für diesen Preis top.Das Mikroskop verfügt nicht über variable Vergrößerungen, aber durch die Möglichkeit variabler Abstände gepaart mit der Fokuseinstellung war das für mich kein Problem und ich denke für die meisten Anwendungszwecke stellt das gleichfalls kein Problem dar.Einziger Kritikpunkt: Der Fokus ist nur durch Drehen am Mikroskop selbst einstellbar. Dadurch verwackelt man sehr oft und die Feineinstellung gestaltet sich bei herausfordernden Anwendungen schwierig. Auch macht die Art der Fokuseinstellung den Einbau einer eigenen Fokussierungssteuerung (eine DIY Mikroskop Halterung beispielsweise) o. ä. sehr schwierig. Aber das brauchen die wenigsten Anwender.Trotzdem: Tolles Mikroskop. Das Ergebnis ist sein Geld wert. Und es hat mir sehr weitergeholfen.
Mwah –
Lo uso en una Mac OSX Mojave sin problema alguno. El equipo es perfecto para poder apreciar las medidas de seguridad de billetes como micro impresiones y lineas finas. Puede tomar fotografías de buena calidad de lo que se está observando, lo cual es muy bueno para mis presentaciones de mi trabajo.
Tony –
Gebruikt om blaadjes, stenen en schelpen met de kinderen te bekijken! Werkt top. Lekker simpel.
david mennell –
first let me say… this is not comparing it to a thousand dollar scope camera. having said that: if your looking for essentially a fantastic digital magnifying glass… it’s no good for moving video it refreshes much to slow for that but it will take good stills for referencing circuit boards and other tiny items like jewelry. the field of view is very narrow when using the supplied stand but that can be improved by simply using the suction cup goose neck(which works very well i may add) to something on a vertical plane… like a window or something else smooth. the software, although very simplistic, works very well. i did have to restart my PC to get it to work so try that first before you panic. their web sight was very informative with a video for every type of computer. if i have any criticisms of this scope it would be the LEDs. because they are so close to the C-moss lens they tend to add a lot of flare on the image. ALL inexpensive scopes suffer from this though so i can’t hold it against any one scope. however the camera seems to give a clear image with the LEDs on their lowest setting with a bit, not much, of background lighting. like a table lamp or just ambient room lighting. i think for the money you cant go wrong with it. the term ” you get what you pay for” definitely applies here however… in this case i think you get a bit more. i also may add that the focus adjustment is surprisingly smooth… i certainly wasn’t expecting that. it seems to be a very well thought out product that is built well and performs exactly as advertised.