RFID tags: types, characteristics and real examples
RFID tags
| Family | Frequency | Typical range | Power | Typical uses |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LF (low frequency) | 125–134 kHz | centimeters | passive | animal ear tags, access fobs that must work through water and tissue |
| HF (high frequency) | 13.56 MHz | centimeters | passive | contactless payment, access cards, NFC phone tags (NTAG family) |
| NFC | 13.56 MHz | a few centimeters | passive | pairing, posters and labels a phone taps on purpose |
| UHF RAIN (Gen2) | 860–960 MHz | meters, up to ~12 m | passive | retail apparel, pallets, cases, yard and warehouse tracking |
| Active (incl. BAP) | 433 MHz / 2.4 GHz | tens to hundreds of meters | battery | vehicle tracking, large yards, sensor telemetry |
| RFID tag | Size (mm) | Max read range* | Use case | Mass | Chip / memory |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Confidex Survivor | 155 (139) x 26 x 14,5 | 18 m | All-surface tag for logistics, transportation and yard management applications with top performance | 31 g | EPC Gen2 |
| Confidex Ironside | 51,5 x 47,5 x 10 | 9 m | The most durable tag for challenging industrial asset management applications | 22 g | EPC Gen2, 240 bit EPC |
| Confidex Ironside Micro | 27 x 27 x 5,5 | 4 m on metal | Compact on-metal tag where a full Ironside does not fit: tools, small parts, IT assets | 4 g | EPC Gen2 |
| Avery Dennison AD DogBone U9 | 94 x 24 | up to 12 m | Long-range asset and pallet tag; the classic large-format dry inlay for cases and pallets | under 1 g (inlay) | NXP UCODE 9, EPC 96/128 bit |
| Avery Dennison AD Burst M830 | 73 x 13,5 | up to 9 m | Small-parcel tag: apparel hang tags, polybags, item-level retail where the label stays narrow | under 1 g (inlay) | Impinj M830, EPC 96/128 bit |
* Best-case figures on the matching surface (metal tags measured on metal) at maximum allowed reader power; walls, liquids and nearby metal cut them down. On-metal designs carry their own ground plane — a standard label inlay goes silent on metal, so match the tag family to the mounting surface first and worry about range second.
| Tag Type | Printer | Antenna Position | Backfeed | Read/Write Power |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monza R6 | Zebra R110Xi4 | A4 | B4 | 27/27 |
Encoding rule of thumb: the EPC written must fit the chip — 24 hex characters for 96-bit EPC, 32 for 128-bit. Count the characters before blaming the antenna, and keep printed text and barcodes inside the printable area of the specific inlay (see the sizes above, not the nominal label size).
Article author: Andrei Olegovich