Scannable Links with NFC

2024-08-13 | By Adafruit Industries

License: See Original Project RFID / NFC Wearables Wireless

Courtesy of Adafruit

Guide by Erin St Blaine

Overview

Are you a connector? Are you always handing out business cards, ‎sending people to your Etsy store, your blog, or your product? Do you ‎meet people at festivals or conventions and need an easy way to ‎connect, and stay connected? This tutorial is for you.‎

With an NFC tag and a few clicks in a smartphone app, you can ‎create a necklace, necktie, hat or costume piece that not only makes ‎you look sharp, but also helps you connect with your people. Simply ‎tap your necklace to a smart phone with NFC technology (which is ‎most of them, these days) and your contact info will appear on their ‎screen like magic.‎

Or, set up a Venmo link on your NFC tag to make a tap-to-pay sign ‎that's even easier for your customers to use than a QR code. NFC ‎tags offer so many possibilities.‎

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Parts

Adafruit carries a lot of different NFC tags in various formats. For this ‎tutorial, be sure you're getting one that's labeled NTAG2** instead of ‎‎"Classic" -- the newer NTAG2 devices work with modern smart ‎phone apps and the classic tags don't.‎

Program your Tag

LinkTree

I have four Instagram accounts, three Facebook pages, two websites ‎and an Etsy store. When I meet someone and want to share contact ‎info it can get tricky to send them to the right place.‎

I use a free service called LinkTree to solve this problem. Sign up for ‎a free LinkTree account and you can create a simple mobile-friendly ‎web page with a custom list of links, so folks can follow whichever ‎account you want, or get a quick Venmo link.‎

Using a service like LinkTree means your tag(s) won’t require re-‎programming as social media platforms come and go; your LinkTree ‎‎“parking space” stays put, you just curate the links there.‎

Go to the App Store (for iPhone) or the Google Play store (for Android) ‎and download the NFC Tools app. There are several apps available ‎for writing to NFC chips, but this is the one I had the most success ‎with after testing a few.‎

Open the app and click the "Write" button, then click "Add a record".‎

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You have a lot of options here, so feel free to explore. For this guide, ‎click "URI" to add a URI record. This will pop up whatever link you'd ‎like on your new friend's phone when you tap it with your necklace.‎

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Once you've entered your URI, click "Write" and bring your NFC tag ‎close to the top of your phone. The phone will scan the tag and ‎program it with the URI you've chosen.‎

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Now, take your NFC tag and tap it on the top of your smart phone. If ‎everything worked, you'll see a notification with a clickable link that ‎opens up a web browser and displays your URI. Success! That was ‎easy.‎

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The user clicks the link, and your site appears like magic!‎

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Troubleshooting

If you're not having success, here are a few things to try:‎

Do you have an NTAG2 device? These apps don't work with the ‎classic tags.‎‎
Try a different app. I had more success with NFC Tools than ‎with some of the others available, but your results may vary.‎‎
Bluetooth NFC connections are not allowed on iPhone devices -‎‎- Apple has blocked this avenue. Disappointing, but iPhone ‎users can still create links or use many of the other available ‎features.‎

Decorate your Tag

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These tags are small and light and can be attached to almost ‎anything. The NFC stickers are flexible and can be wrapped around a ‎pen or stuck to your festival totem. Our NFC buttons can be sewn ‎onto any piece of clothing or a purse. My favorite is the NFC dots: a ‎small round disc about the size of a quarter. These can be easily ‎hidden inside a necklace or other costume piece or hidden under a ‎sticker on your backpack.‎

You can also go old-school and use a credit card sized NFC, to ‎replace the classic stack of business cards in your wallet.‎

The one thing you'll want to avoid is placing them in or near ‎anything made of metal. The metal will block the signal and the tag ‎reader won't work.‎

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And that’s really all there is to it! Straightforward once you have the ‎walk-through; all those acronyms and frequencies only make ‎it seem complex.‎