One Marker, two ways in
Every Marker is a three-inch square with no power source and no screen. Inside it is an NFC chip. Printed on the face, unless you have deliberately turned it off, is a QR code. Both carry the same address, so a visitor who holds a phone against the Marker and a visitor who points a camera at it land in exactly the same place.
On the reverse, under the NearField mark, is a six-character PIN. That PIN is how you claim the Marker for your account the first time. See Registering a Marker.
- A compact, UV-resistant Marker: mount it indoors or outdoors.
- An NFC chip and a printed QR code, so people can tap or scan.
- Mounting adhesive, included in the box.
- Its own code, printed into the design and paired to the chip inside.
- Works on every modern iPhone and Android: nothing for a visitor to install.
What a tap actually does
The chip and the QR do not contain your Experience. They contain the Marker's own address, and that address is resolved by NearField at the moment it is opened.
What a tap does
A phone touches the Marker
Or the camera reads its QR code. No app, no account, nothing to install.
The Marker's own address opens
/m/{marker}?src=nfc
This never changes. It is printed into the chip and the code at the factory.
NearField looks up what it points at
This is the part you control, and the part you can change at any time.
Your Experience renders
/view/{experience}
Counted as a visit, with the tap or scan recorded against that Marker.
The third step is the one worth holding on to. Because the lookup happens on our side and not in the Marker, you can change what a Marker opens whenever you like without touching the Marker, reprinting anything, or asking anyone to update a link.
NFC and QR, side by side
| NFC | QR | |
|---|---|---|
| Where it lives | A chip sealed inside the Marker | Printed on the face |
| How a visitor uses it | Holds the top of the phone against the Marker | Opens the camera and points at the code |
| Range | Contact, or nearly | Roughly ten times the width of the printed code |
| Works on | Every modern iPhone and most Android phones | Any phone with a camera |
| Needs an app | No | No |
What a Marker is not
- Not a printed QR code. A printed code is fixed at the printer. A Marker is repointable from your account, forever.
- Not a beacon. It has no battery and broadcasts nothing. Nothing happens until a phone is deliberately held against it or a camera is aimed at it.
- Not a tracker. It cannot see who tapped it. What it records is that a tap happened, and which of the three routes brought the visitor in.
- Not tied to one Experience. A Marker can be relinked as often as you like, and its history follows it.
Example
Cedar Hollow Zoo & Aquarium
Cedar Hollow mounts one Marker on the rail at the otter viewing window. In summer it opens an Experience with the feeding times and a keeper video. In November the same Marker opens a winter-hours Experience instead. Nobody visits the rail to change it, and the printed code on the face is the one it left the factory with.
Do visitors need the NearField app?
No. Nothing in the visitor path involves an app. The NearField Builder app on iOS is for you, not for them.
Does a Marker need power or Wi-Fi?
The Marker needs neither. The visitor's phone needs an internet connection to load the Experience, the same as it would for any web page.
Can I use my own NFC tags or printed codes instead?
You can point any code or tag you already own at an Experience's public link, but you lose the thing that makes a Marker worth having: with a Marker, the address never changes, so you never reprint.
What happens if a Marker stops working?
We replace it. Every Marker ships tested, and if one does not work we send another, no questions.
Ready to put one on a wall?
Browse Marker designs