RFID chips are a cru­cial com­po­nent of RFID sys­tems, used for stor­ing and trans­mit­ting data in var­i­ous appli­ca­tions such as inven­to­ry man­age­ment, access con­trol, and asset track­ing. Under­stand­ing the stor­age capac­i­ty of RFID chips is essen­tial for select­ing the right chip for your spe­cif­ic needs.

Types and Storage Capacities of RFID Chips

Pas­sive RFID Chips: These chips do not have bat­ter­ies and require pow­er from the RFID read­er to oper­ate. Their stor­age capac­i­ty typ­i­cal­ly ranges from 64 bits (8 bytes) to 8 kilo­bytes (KB). Com­mon pas­sive RFID chips, such as those used for access con­trol and inven­to­ry man­age­ment, usu­al­ly store a unique iden­ti­fi­er and a small amount of data. For exam­ple, an EPC (Elec­tron­ic Prod­uct Code) chip can store approx­i­mate­ly 128 bits (16 bytes) of data.

Active RFID Chips: Active RFID chips have a built-in bat­tery, allow­ing for longer sig­nal trans­mis­sion dis­tances and typ­i­cal­ly larg­er stor­age capac­i­ties. Depend­ing on the spe­cif­ic appli­ca­tion, their data stor­age capac­i­ty ranges from 1 KB to 64 KB. Active chips are com­mon­ly used to track high-val­ue assets and can store detailed infor­ma­tion such as loca­tion his­to­ry and envi­ron­men­tal data.

Semi-pas­sive RFID chips: These chips have a built-in bat­tery that pow­ers the chip’s cir­cuit­ry, but still require an exter­nal read­er for com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Their stor­age capac­i­ty varies great­ly, typ­i­cal­ly rang­ing from 1 KB to 32 KB. Semi-pas­sive chips are suit­able for appli­ca­tions requir­ing larg­er data stor­age capac­i­ty while main­tain­ing the high ener­gy effi­cien­cy of pas­sive chips.

Factors Affecting Storage Capacity

Appli­ca­tion Require­ments: The spe­cif­ic require­ments of your appli­ca­tion will deter­mine the required stor­age capac­i­ty. For exam­ple, an access con­trol sys­tem may only need to store unique iden­ti­fiers, while an inven­to­ry man­age­ment sys­tem may need oth­er data such as prod­uct details, expi­ra­tion dates, or track­ing infor­ma­tion.

Data Struc­ture: The struc­ture and orga­ni­za­tion of data on an RFID chip also affect stor­age capac­i­ty. Some chips may employ more effi­cient data encod­ing meth­ods, thus stor­ing more infor­ma­tion with­in the same phys­i­cal space.

Secu­ri­ty Fea­tures: RFID chips with advanced secu­ri­ty fea­tures such as encryp­tion and authen­ti­ca­tion may require addi­tion­al stor­age space to store secu­ri­ty keys and pro­to­cols, which may reduce the avail­able space for user data.

Common RFID Chip Parameters

Chip mod­el	Brand	Type	Fre­quen­cy	Mem­o­ry	Read-Write time	Data con­ser­va­tion	Pro­to­cal
Mifare S50	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	1Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO 14443A
Mifare S70	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	4Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO 14443A
Mifare des­fire 2k	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	2Kbyte	500000	10 years	ISO 14443A
Mifare des­fire 4k	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	4Kbyte	500000	10 years	ISO 14443A
Mifare des­fire 8k	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	8Kbyte	500000	10 years	ISO 14443A
Mifare ultra­light	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	64byte	100000	5 years	ISO 14443A
Mifare PLUSS2K/X2K	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	2byte	200000	10 years	ISO 14443A
M1 PLUSS2K/4K	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	4byte	200000	10 years	ISO 14443A
I‑CODE SLI	NXP	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	1024bits	100000	40 years	ISO15693
HITAG1	NXP	Con­tact­less	125KHZ	2048bits	100000	10 years	ISO11784/785
HITAG2	NXP	Con­tact­less	125KHZ	256bits	100000	10 years	ISO11784/785
HITAG3	NXP	Con­tact­less	125KHZ	256/2048bits	100000	10 years	ISO11784/785
FM11RF08	FUDAN	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	1Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO14443A
FM11RF32	FUDAN	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	4Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO14443A
FM1208 series	FUDAN	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	8Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO14443A
FM1204	FUDAN	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	4Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO14443A
Legic256	Legic	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	256byte	100000	10 years
Ti2048	TI	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	256byte	100000	10 years	ISO15693
ID4001/4100	RUIXIN	Con­tact­less	125KHZ	–	100000	10 years	–
EM4200/4305	EM	Con­tact­less	125KHZ	–	100000	10 years	–
T5577	ATMEL	Con­tact­less	125KHZ	330bits	100000	10 years	ISO1178/785
U‑CODE HSL	HSL	Con­tact­less	915KHZ	2048bits	100000	10 years	ISO18000-6B
Alien9662(H3)	ATMEL	Con­tact­less	915KHZ	96bit EPC/512Bit user­mem­o­ry	100000	10 years	ISO18000-6C
Fm1216 series	FUDAN	Con­tact­less	13.56Mhz	16Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO14443A
SLE4442/5542	SIEMENS	Con­tact	–	256byte	100000	10 years	ISO7816
SLE4428/5528	SIEMENS	Con­tact	–	1byte	100000	10 years	ISO7816
45DB041	ATMEL	Con­tact	–	528Kbyte	100000	10 years	ISO7816
AT88SC102	ATMEL	Con­tact	–	1024bits	100000	10 years	ISO7816
AT88SC1604	ATMEL	Con­tact	–	5704bits	100000	10 years	ISO7816
AT88SC153	ATMEL	Con­tact	–	2048bits	100000	10 years	ISO7816
24 series		Con­tact	–	1k-64k­bits	100000	10 years	ISO7816

HYD­card offers a vari­ety of RFID chips with dif­fer­ent stor­age capac­i­ties, which can be cus­tomized to your needs. Con­tact us today to find the RFID solu­tion best suit­ed for your busi­ness!