NFC business card: how tap-to-share works, and what it cannot do
An NFC business card is a card with a small chip that opens your digital card when someone taps a phone against it. Here is what the chip holds, what happens on a tap, what a tap cannot do, and where OvniCard stands.
What is inside an NFC card
The chip is a passive tag: no battery, powered by the phone's own radio field when the phone comes within a few centimetres. It stores one short record, on a business card almost always a web address, in a standard format called NDEF that every NFC-capable phone reads. The card itself holds no name, phone or photo. It holds the link, and the link opens the card.
What happens on a tap
On an iPhone that reads tags in the background (iPhone XS and later), holding the top edge of the phone near the card shows a notification; tapping it opens the link in Safari. On Android, NFC has to be switched on and the phone unlocked, and the link opens in the default browser. Either way the other person installs nothing: the link is an ordinary web page. If the link is an OvniCard, the page shows the card and offers the contact to save.
What a tap cannot do
It cannot reach a phone across a table, through a thick case or through metal; it works at touching distance. It does nothing on a phone with NFC switched off, and nothing on a phone without NFC at all. A tap opens a link; by itself it does not write a contact into the address book, it cannot be shown on a video call, and it cannot sit in an email signature. That is why a QR code and a plain link travel with the same card: they cover every situation the tap does not.
Buying and writing a tag
NFC tags are sold as blank plastic cards, stickers and key fobs. The common chips (NTAG213, NTAG215 and NTAG216, all NFC Forum Type 2 tags) differ mainly in how much they store, and a short link fits on every one of them. A tag is written with a phone: an app writes the NDEF record, and the tag can be rewritten later unless it is locked. Because the tag holds only your link, editing your card never means rewriting the tag.
Where OvniCard stands today
Today OvniCard shares by link and by a vCard QR code, which work on every phone with a browser or a camera. The iPhone app, coming to the App Store, writes your OvniCard link to an NFC tag you hold the phone to, and reads tags the same way; the web app does not write tags, because browsers on iPhone cannot. Nothing about NFC is sold here until it ships: no store badge, no pre-order, no chip in a box.
Frequently asked questions
Do they need an app to read my NFC card?
No. The tag holds a link, and the phone's own NFC reader opens it in the browser.
Can I edit my card after the tag is written?
Yes. The tag only stores the link; the card behind it changes without touching the tag.
Will my paper cards still matter?
Yes. Print the QR on them and the same card opens from paper, from a tap, or from a text message.
Make your card
The web app works today in any browser. The iPhone app is coming to the App Store; no badge or link appears here until it is live.