Comparison

NFC Reader / Writer vs Scanning cards

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

NFC Reader / Writer

This utility app allows you to read, save, and share information stored on NFC tags. It can extract data like URLs, contact cards, and text messages. Note that NFC tag reading requires an iPhone 7 or newer.

Highlights
  • Read NFC tags
  • Save tags for later
  • Share tag data
  • Save contacts from tags
  • Open URLs from tags
  • Display text messages
Features
Read full description

With NFC Reader you can read tags, save them for later viewing, share them, save contacts, open URLs and more! Be advised: Reading NFC tags requires iPhone 7, 8, or X. FAQ: - Will my iPhone work with NFC? That depends: iPhone 7 and up supports NFC reading and NFC reading only works when NFC tags are NDEF formatted. If you're not sure what that means, you can reach out to our support for more information. - Are NFC tags RFID tags? No, NFC NDEF tags are not RFID tags - this means your gym cards, debit/credit cards, hotel cards, etc aren't readable by this app. - Will this app help me pair to my speaker/router/camera/etc? No, this app doesn't support deep integrations into NFC enabled products - this app is intended to read NFC tags and display data within those tags. Some tags contain actionable data like website URLs, text messages, geotags, contact cards, etc. If you have any questions, reach out to me at andrew@baristable.com

About

Scanning cards

Features
Read full description

Scanning cards turns the business cards you collect at events, meetings, and conferences into organized, searchable contacts — without typing a single field by hand. SCAN, DON'T TYPE Point your camera at a card and CardKeeper auto-detects the edges, captures front and back, and reads the text with on-device OCR — name, title, company, phone, email, website, and address all filled in for you. QR CONTACT CODES Card has a contact QR code instead? CardKeeper recognizes vCard and MECARD formats automatically and fills in every field from the code — no OCR guessing needed. BATCH SCAN MODE Met a dozen people today? Scan the whole stack back-to-back without stopping to edit each one. Review and clean up everything in one pass afterward — nothing gets lost, nothing slows you down mid-event. VOICE NOTES Just finished a conversation? Record a 15-second voice memo — "Met Sarah at booth 4, interested in enterprise plan, follow up Tuesday" — and it's transcribed straight into the note field. Choose your transcription language in Settings. STAY ORGANIZED • Group contacts into custom categories (Clients, Vendors, Leads...) • Add follow-up tasks with due dates, right from the card • Add free-text notes to any contact • Save any card straight to your iOS Contacts FIND ANYONE, FAST Search understands natural phrasing, not just exact names — try "architects from Ahmedabad" or "people interested in CRM" and CardKeeper searches across name, title, company, address, and your notes. PRIVATE BY DESIGN Your cards and contacts stay on your device. Scanning, OCR, and search all run locally — no account, no sign-up, no cloud sync required. Perfect for conferences, trade shows, sales calls, and any day you come home with a stack of business cards to deal with.

Screenshots

NFC Reader / Writer1 screens
Scanning cards4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Scanning cards at none against NFC Reader / Writer's 1. Scanning cards also leads on ads (none vs shown). NFC Reader / Writer's advantage is device support (3 vs 1). On price and iOS requirement there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. NFC Reader / Writer sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Scanning cards asks for nothing beyond the download.

Scorecard3 real differences · 7 level
NFC Reader / Writer versus Scanning cards: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterNFC Reader / WriterScanning cards
PriceFreeFree
Rating3.6 (19 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews16.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings19 — better—
Update frequencyMonthly—
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone
Requires iOS18.617.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size5 MB13 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperAndrew SowersPLUS INFOSYS

Bugs and requests

NFC Reader / Writer

Reported bugs

7 issues
  • App crashes immediately on launch for devices without NFC support
  • NFC reading fails on iPhone 6, 6S, and SE despite claimed compatibility
  • Session invalidated - feature not supported error messages
  • Apple Pay popup appears when scanning NFC tags
  • Unreadable symbols displayed on screen during scanning
Show 2 more
  • App won't open on multiple device models
  • CoreNFC framework compatibility issues

Requested features

6 requests
  • Support for older iPhone models (iPhone 6, 6S, SE)
  • Ability to open amiibo files from Google Drive
  • Italian language support
  • Better error handling and user notifications
  • Support for writing NFC tags on all compatible devices
Show 1 more
  • Graceful handling for devices without NFC hardware

Scanning cards

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

1 purchases

NFC Reader / Writer

One-time1
  • Remove Ads$1.99
None

Scanning cards

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is NFC Reader / Writer free?
NFC Reader / Writer is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Scanning cards free?
Scanning cards is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do NFC Reader / Writer or Scanning cards have ads?
NFC Reader / Writer shows ads; Scanning cards does not.

Other comparisons