[turtle]

I read an article about placing NFC tags around your home to work with Shortcuts. I never really thought about this given NFC wasn't an option with the ability was first physically added to the phone. You could unlock select hotel rooms and such, but that was about it. Apparently today you can use NFC willy-nilly.

So my question is: does anyone use them on these forums? If so, what do you use them for?

The article suggested that you create shortcuts in the app and then program the NFC tag to trigger that shortcut. This way you can initiate the shortcut manually or by tapping your phone to the tag. You can get 40 tags for ~$13 that are PVC and about the size of a quarter. Seems like there is a lot of potential for something like this.

[turtle]

So I take it no one uses these at all?

I might just have to buy some to play with and test it out. It seems like it could be really handy to have once configured.

[Brad]

The only remotely common thing I've ever seen even people do with NFC tags is to write Amiibo data to them so they don't have to buy/hoard/store/transport all the figurines, and even that is a pretty tiny niche and requires a specific type of NFC tag (though they're also pretty cheap).

[turtle]

I've used them before a number of times. Skylanders, Minecraft Earth mini figs... that kind of thing. What I've never used it for is automation though. That is what I'm thinking about.

So I went ahead and threw $14 at a pack of tags and will play. I figure it can't hurt and I've thrown $14 at worse things than this. Here is a PC Mag article that talks about ideas for using the NFC tags around your house. I guess it is also iPhone XS and up though, just just the X.

[turtle]

I got my tags in today. I'm like a kid in a candy store right now. It is amazing the things you can have them do. Basically, if you have a Shortcut in the app then you can make an NFC tag trigger it.

The best I've done so far is with one of my Minecraft Earth minis that triggers some lights to turn on. Basically the NFC chip in the mini fig is readable for Shortcuts and I have it initiate a Scene in Home.app.

However, you can don some really ornate and intricate things with this as well with scripting and such within Shortcuts. Apparently you can even add IFTTT to the mix and go super extreme. Right now I'm using it to turn lights on with my phone (via tap) and log my water intake.

I'm going to do more... but this is essentially the "Hello World" of NFC tags for me. Totally worth the $14 for the pack of tags from Amazon.

[turtle]

So the more I look into this I understand better why more people don't use them. Shortcuts can be real programming rather than just handy multi-tasking buttons. Personally I think it will be worth it in the end for people to take the time to learn them.

[chucker]

I occasionally remember this feature exists and really can’t figure out a good use case.

[turtle]

I've gotten a few cases that work well. Turning on the light in my bedroom is one. While I can use my voice, my phone is almost always in my hand so now I can tap to turn on the light. I eat mints at my desk all the time, now I tap a spot to log the calories into the food intake tracking app. I have one for water but always forget to actually use it.

My most commonly used one is actually one that starts my workout playlist and plays it to a specific speaker. So when I get ready to workout I tap the phone and my tunes are playing what I want and where I want them.