First Project Ideas With a Raspberry Pi: What to Do After Unboxing

You've got a Raspberry Pi, a power supply, and a microSD card. Maybe a case. Maybe a keyboard and mouse. You plug it in, Raspberry Pi OS loads up, and you're staring at a Linux desktop wondering what you're supposed to do with this thing.

The Pi can do hundreds of different things, but that's exactly the problem when you're starting out. Here's a sensible path through your first few projects, each one building on what you learned before.

First: Just Use It as a Computer

Before jumping into projects, spend an afternoon just using the Pi as a regular computer. Browse the web. Open the file manager. Try the pre-installed apps. Open a terminal and type a few basic Linux commands: ls to list files, cd to change directories, pwd to see where you are.

This isn't a "project," but it's important. Getting comfortable with the desktop and the terminal makes everything that follows easier. The Pi runs Linux, and a little familiarity with Linux goes a long way.

Update the system while you're at it. Open a terminal and run sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade. You'll do this often, so get used to it now.

Project 1: Set Up SSH and Go Headless

This is the first real skill to learn. Enable SSH (through Preferences > Raspberry Pi Configuration > Interfaces), find your Pi's IP address (type hostname -I in the terminal), and connect to it from another computer using SSH.

On a Mac or Linux machine, just open a terminal and type ssh pi@your-pi-ip-address. On Windows, use PowerShell or PuTTY.

Once this works, you can unplug the monitor, keyboard, and mouse. Your Pi runs "headless" and you control it entirely from your main computer. This is how most people end up using their Pi long-term, so learning it early saves you from keeping a second monitor permanently occupied.

Project 2: Run a Local Web Server

Install Nginx (a lightweight web server) with one command: sudo apt install nginx. Open a browser and go to your Pi's IP address. You'll see the default Nginx welcome page.

Now edit the default HTML file to say something else. Navigate to /var/www/html/, edit index.html, and reload the browser. You just served a web page from your Pi to any device on your network.

This project teaches you about web servers, file permissions, and editing files on Linux. It's also the foundation for a lot of future projects since many Pi applications run as web services you access through a browser.

Project 3: Install Pi-hole

Pi-hole blocks ads and trackers across your entire home network by acting as your DNS server. Install it with the one-line installer from the Pi-hole website, point your router's DNS settings to the Pi's IP address, and ads start disappearing from every device in the house.

The Pi-hole web dashboard shows you stats: how many queries were blocked, which domains are the worst offenders, and which devices are making the most requests. It's eye-opening to see how many tracking requests your smart TV or phone makes in a day.

This is one of those projects that immediately proves the Pi's value to everyone in your household. When the ads vanish from phones and tablets without installing anything, people notice.

Project 4: Write Your First Python Script

Python comes pre-installed on the Pi, and it's the language most Pi tutorials use. Open Thonny (the pre-installed Python IDE) and write something simple:

Start with printing text, getting user input, and doing basic calculations. Then write a script that does something mildly useful: a unit converter, a random quote generator, or a countdown timer.

The goal isn't to become a Python expert. It's to get comfortable running scripts and understanding the basics: variables, loops, conditionals, and functions. Every hardware project later on will use Python, so a little comfort now pays dividends.

Project 5: Blink an LED (With GPIO)

If you have a breadboard, an LED, a resistor, and a couple of jumper wires, you can do the classic first hardware project. Connect an LED to one of the Pi's GPIO pins and write a Python script using the gpiozero library to turn it on and off.

from gpiozero import LED
from time import sleep

led = LED(17)
while True:
    led.on()
    sleep(1)
    led.off()
    sleep(1)

This is a pivotal moment. Your code is controlling something physical. A light is blinking because of a script you wrote. It's the same rush Arduino users feel, but you did it with Python on a Linux computer.

From here, add a button to control the LED. Then a sensor to read temperature. The gpiozero library makes GPIO work surprisingly beginner-friendly.

Project 6: Set Up a Samba File Share

Turn your Pi into a simple network file server. Install Samba, configure a shared folder, and access it from any computer on your network. On Windows it shows up in File Explorer. On Mac it appears in Finder.

Now you have a shared folder everyone in the house can use. Drop files in, access them from any device. Plug in a USB hard drive and you've got a basic NAS.

This teaches Linux file permissions, configuration files, and network services. All useful skills for more complex projects later.

Project 7: Docker and Your First Container

Install Docker on the Pi and run your first container. Start with something practical like Portainer (a web-based Docker management tool) or a simple container like Nginx.

Docker changes how you think about running services on the Pi. Instead of installing software directly and worrying about conflicts and dependencies, each service runs in its own isolated container. Want to try something? Pull the container. Don't like it? Delete it. Nothing else is affected.

Once Docker clicks, you can run dozens of services on a single Pi: media servers, dashboards, monitoring tools, home automation, all without them stepping on each other.

Project 8: Automate Something With Cron

Write a Python script that does something useful and schedule it to run automatically with cron. A script that checks your external IP address and emails you if it changes. A script that backs up a folder to a USB drive every night. A script that downloads the weather forecast every morning and saves it to a file.

Cron is the Pi's built-in task scheduler. Edit it with crontab -e and tell it when to run your script. Now your Pi is doing work for you while you sleep. That's the moment it stops being a hobby project and starts being a useful tool.

Project 9: Home Assistant

If you're interested in smart home, install Home Assistant. It turns the Pi into a hub that controls lights, sensors, switches, and devices from dozens of different brands through a single interface.

Home Assistant is a bigger project than the previous ones, but by this point you've learned SSH, web servers, Linux basics, and maybe Docker. You have the skills to set it up and manage it. And the result is a smart home system that runs locally, respects your privacy, and doesn't depend on any company's cloud.

Where to Go From Here

After these projects, you'll have a solid understanding of Linux, networking, Python, and how to make the Pi do useful work. From here, the direction is yours: media servers, security cameras, development environments, Kubernetes clusters, whatever interests you.

The most important thing you've learned isn't any specific project. It's the ability to look at a problem, search for a solution, install some software, configure it, and troubleshoot when it doesn't work the first time. That's the real skill, and it applies to every Pi project you'll ever do.