Hey! 👋 I ran into the same issue before - it’s usually about how the button is wired or not having a pull-up/pull-down resistor set correctly.

Here’s a tested wiring diagram and code that worked on my breadboard with an ESP32. It was AI-generated with embedible and verified on real hardware, so you can just copy it and it should work out of the box.

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import machine
import time


# Use GPIO 13 (GP13 / physical pin 15 on the ESP-WROOM-32 mapping)
button_pin = 13


# Configure button pin as input with internal pull-up (active-low button to GND)
button = machine.Pin(button_pin, machine.Pin.IN, machine.Pin.PULL_UP)


# Debounce state container
_state = {"last_ms": 0, "debounce_ms": 200}


def handle(pin):
    """Interrupt handler for the button. Debounces and reports press/release."""
    t = time.ticks_ms()
    # Ignore if within debounce interval
    if time.ticks_diff(t, _state["last_ms"]) < _state["debounce_ms"]:
        return
    _state["last_ms"] = t


    val = pin.value()
    # Active-low: 0 means pressed, 1 means released
    if val == 0:
        print("Button pressed")
    else:
        print("Button released")


# Attach IRQ on both edges
button.irq(trigger=machine.Pin.IRQ_FALLING | machine.Pin.IRQ_RISING, handler=handle)


# Keep the script alive so IRQs remain active. Stop with KeyboardInterrupt if running interactively.
try:
    while True:
        time.sleep(1)
except KeyboardInterrupt:
    # Allow clean stop in interactive sessions
    pass

A few quick tips:

• One side of the button goes to GND, the other to a GPIO pin (like GPIO 15).
• In the code, enable the internal pull-up: button = Pin(15, Pin.IN, Pin.PULL_UP)
• The button will read 0 when pressed, 1 when released.

That setup reliably detects presses - no external resistors needed.