RFID Card or contactless smart card using various technologies that make use of radio waves to identify objects or people. Where proximity card and vicinity card are mainly using parts of those technologies that defines RFID card. Both proximity card (or prox card) and vicinity card are “contactless” RFID smart card which can be read without inserting it into a reader device, but what is the difference between proximity card and vicinity card?
The term “proximity card” refers to mainly 125 kHz devices or low frequency RFID card. Where vicinity card is refer to those RFID card using ISO/IEC 15693 standard at high frequency 13.56 MHz.
Proximity cards typically enable read-only capability while vicinity card or other RFID cards enable both read and write functionalities.
The more widely used passive proximity card has a limited reading range and therefore must be held close to the reader unit. Vicinity card on the other hand offer maximum read distance about 1–1.5 meters.
Related sources
What Is a Proximity Card?
HID Proximity Cards: Classification and Selection
How Prox Cards Work | A Beginner’s Guide to RFID Access Control
Proximity Cards, Vicinity Cards, and RFID Cards: What’s the Connection?
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