H-Bridge vs Motor shield for the arduino Assuming we wish to control a small toy car with an arduino - meaning spinning the right and left wheels forward and backward and being able to break and control the speed, where each wheel has it's own engine (but of course two engines on the same side will run on the same speed and direction).

We saw we have two main options - Buying and wiring up a H-Bridge or buying a motor shield (which is based on one).

Are there any advantages for using a motor shield?

Thanks in advance.
If I were a beginner, I'd go with the Motor shield.

I'm even personaly using the one from DfRobot, which as @Gerben said, is just plug and play.

It also allows you to select the input power for the motors, which can be either from the 5V Arduino pin or from an external battery. This is pretty convenient if you need more than 5V to power up your motors. It can also support 2A of current draw, which is more than enough for small arduino toy cards.

Here is the shield: https://www.dfrobot.com/index.php?route=product/product&amp;product_id=1180&amp;search=2A&amp;description=true