Common questions
The other guide pages walk through each task. This page answers what comes up around them: what the app costs and what it asks of your iPhone. It also answers where a tag goes after you scan it.
What it costs
Does Hex NFC cost anything?
No. Hex NFC costs nothing, and there are no accounts, subscriptions, in-app purchases or paid features. Install Hex NFC from the App Store and the whole app is there.
What is the development-costs card?
A progress figure, and nothing you have to act on. The Hex NFC home screen carries a card headed Development Costs Recovered that shows how much of the project's cost has come back so far. View Breakdown opens a page on the Hex Pro website in your browser, where contributing is voluntary. Nothing in the app is unlocked by anything on that page.
Does the app show ads?
No ad network runs inside it. The home screen may show a card headed More from Hex Pro for another app by the same publisher. No third-party ad network, no tracking and no personalisation sit behind that card: everyone sees the same one.
What your iPhone needs
Which iPhones can run Hex NFC?
Any iPhone running iOS 17 or later, which means the iPhone XR and iPhone XS onwards, plus the second and third-generation iPhone SE. Every one of those carries the NFC reader the app uses, so the iOS version is the only thing to check. Hex NFC is an iPhone app and does not run on an iPad. On a device without the reader, a scan ends with "This device does not support NFC." instead of looking for a tag.
Do I need an internet connection?
No. Reading a tag, writing one and protecting one all happen between your iPhone and the tag. The app reaches Hex Pro for three things. Two are the development-costs figure and the card for another Hex Pro app. The third is a station name you choose to send from a transit card. iCloud sync is the fourth use of the network, and it stays off until you turn it on. See Privacy and your data.
Why will my iPhone not read one of my tags?
Its chip may be one an iPhone cannot read at all. MIFARE Classic is the common case, and it is an iOS limitation rather than a fault in the tag. See Tags that work with Hex NFC for the chips the app recognises.
The tags you scan
What happens to a tag after I scan it?
The scan is saved on your iPhone, under History on the Library screen. That list is capped, and an unpinned row expires with age as well; a row you have pinned stays past both limits. Deleting a row removes the stored scan. See Find a tag you scanned before.
Are passports and transit cards saved as well?
The two differ. A passport read is held for that one session and dropped when you close the sheet. None of it reaches your history, an export or iCloud. A transit card read is saved like any other scan. The row sits under History on the Library screen and counts against the 50 rows that list holds. While iCloud sync is on, it is mirrored to iCloud. Opening that row shows the card as it was read, and deleting the row removes the stored scan. See Read a passport and Read a transit card.
Does anything about my tags leave my iPhone?
Only if you turn on iCloud sync, which sits in the Sync group on the Settings screen and starts off. It mirrors your presets and your scan history into your private iCloud database, which Apple operates and your Apple ID protects. Tag passwords are never part of it: they stay in the iOS Keychain on the iPhone that set them. See Settings and Privacy and your data.
Can Hex NFC recover a tag password I have forgotten?
No, and nothing else can either. The tag itself checks the password, so protected memory on a tag whose password is lost is irrecoverable. A password you set is kept in the Keychain of the iPhone that set it. On a second iPhone, the same tag asks you to enter it. See Tag protection.
If a scan or a write fails, work through the message you saw in If a tag does not scan or write.