Contact standard

ISO/IEC 7816 contact smart card testing

ISO/IEC 7816 is the contact smart-card standard — the gold-contact chip behind SIM cards, payment chips and ID cards. Unlike contactless, the card is powered and clocked through physical contacts.

What is ISO/IEC 7816?

ISO/IEC 7816 is a multi-part standard for contact integrated-circuit cards. It covers the physical card, the contact layout, the electrical interface and transmission protocols (Part 3, including T=0 and T=1), and the command set and APDUs (Part 4).

It underpins SIM/UICC, contact payment (the chip you insert), and many ID and access cards.

What ISO 7816 testing covers

Electrical — supply, clock, I/O signal levels and timing
Protocol — ATR (answer to reset), T=0 and T=1 transmission and error handling
APDU-level command and response behaviour

Test it with cilab

Test contact smart cards at high speed

cilab's ci220 is a high-speed ISO/IEC 7816 contact test system for characterization and conformance — the contact counterpart to the ci230's contactless coverage.

Explore the ci220

Frequently asked

What is the difference between contact and contactless smart cards?

Contact cards (ISO 7816) are powered and communicate through physical gold contacts; contactless cards (ISO 14443) use a 13.56 MHz RF field. Many cards are dual-interface and support both.

What are T=0 and T=1?

They are the two transmission protocols defined in ISO/IEC 7816-3 for contact cards — T=0 is byte-oriented, T=1 is block-oriented. Test systems must handle both.

Related standards

Contactless standard

ISO/IEC 14443 proximity card testing

ISO/IEC 14443 is the foundation of contactless — the 13.56 MHz proximity standard behind payment cards, transit, eID and access. Almost every NFC and EMV® contactless product builds on it.

Test smart. Certify easy.

See how cilab runs ISO/IEC 7816 on your bench — book a demo with one of our engineers.

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