RFID And NFC Common Standards And Applications

RFID and NFC have many similarities. In addition to applications and frequency bands, they also share many industry standards. Today, I will introduce two of the more common standard protocols.

RFID:

Many people get their sense of RFID from an IBM advertisement: a teenager shopping in a supermarket fills his trench coat and goes to the checkout counter to receive his bill without having to pay. This advertisement shows people vividly the application of RFID in daily life.

RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) is an automatic identification technology that USES radio waves for communication. The basic principle is to achieve automatic identification of tagged items through data communication between the reading head and the tag attached to the object through electromagnetic coupling or inductive coupling. Automatic recognition refers to the application of a certain recognition device, through the proximity between the identified items and the recognition device, automatically obtain the identified items related information, and provide the background computer processing system to complete the relevant follow-up processing technology.

The main frequency bands of RFID are: 125kHz, 134.2khz, 13.56mhz, 860-960mhz, 2.45ghz and 5.8ghz. RFID systems with different working frequencies have different working distances and different application fields. Low frequency band (LF, 125kHz, 134.2khz) RFID system is mainly used for animal identification and factory data acquisition. The RFID system technology of high frequency (HF, 13.56mhz) has been relatively mature, which is widely used in access control, intelligent transportation and other aspects. LF and HF frequency band work with inductively coupled mode, generally with small working distance. The effective working distance of electronic tags in ultra-high frequency band (UHF, 860-960 MHz) RFID system can reach 3-6 meters, which is suitable for logistics, supply chain and other fields. Microwave frequency bands (2.45ghz and 5.8ghz) are applied to container management and highway toll collection. UHF and microwave frequency bands work in electromagnetic coupling mode, with relatively long working distance.

NFC:

NFC stands for Near Field Communication technology. Developed by Philips and SONY, NFC is a contactless identification and connectivity technology that enables near field wireless communication between mobile devices, consumer electronics, PCS and smart control tools. NFC provides a simple, touch-sensitive solution that allows consumers to exchange information, access content and services in a simple and intuitive way. NFC is developed on the basis of RFID, NFC is not much different from RFID in essence, it is based on the signal transmission between two objects close to the geographical location.