Chip position on a card: ISO 7816-⁠2 contact positions

The chip sits on the front of the card, on the left, a little above the middle. ISO/IEC 7816-2 places its contacts 10.25 to 19.87 mm from the left edge and 19.23 to 28.55 mm from the top edge, with the card held landscape. The gold plate you see is bigger than that contact field. A standard 8-pin plate is 13.0 × 11.8 mm and starts 8.56 mm from the left edge and 17.99 mm from the top.

To see whether your design runs under the chip, drop it into the free CR80 card template and artwork checker. It draws the 6-pin or 8-pin plate and a 2 mm keep-clear guide at true scale, and warns about text or logos under the plate itself.

Where exactly are the chip contacts on a card?

Each of the eight contacts must cover at least a 2.0 × 1.7 mm area at the positions below, measured from the left and top edges of the card’s front. The contacts form two columns 7.62 mm apart and four rows 2.54 mm apart, which is 0.300 and 0.100 in: the layout was drawn in inches. ISO fixes only these minimum areas. The shape of each gold pad around them is up to the module maker.

In ISO’s wording, each contact must start at or before the first value and reach at least the second. The numbers are the same in the 1999 and current 2007 editions of ISO/IEC 7816-2, and they match the contact positions in ETSI TS 102 221, the SIM card specification. The front is the side with the contacts: ISO/IEC 7810 puts the contacts and any embossing on the front and the magnetic stripe on the back.

How big is the gold chip plate?

A standard 8-pin plate is 13.0 × 11.8 mm and a standard 6-pin plate is 11.0 × 8.3 mm, the longer side running along the card. Both are centered on their contact field: 15.06 mm from the left edge, and 23.89 mm (8-pin) or 22.62 mm (6-pin) from the top. The sizes come from module makers’ published package drawings; one maker’s drawing rounds the 8-pin plate’s corners to 2.2 mm.

The contact count does not fix the plate size. Six-contact plates from about 10.4 × 7.6 mm to about 13.2 × 9.1 mm are in use, and some 6-contact chips come in the full 13.0 × 11.8 mm body. If your supplier names its module, use that drawing. If not, design around the 8-pin plate plus its 2 mm keep-clear zone, which covers every common plate.

Why is the chip bigger than the ISO contact field?

Because the contact field, 9.62 × 9.32 mm, is only the area the eight minimum contacts span, and the gold plate around them is larger. The real 8-pin plate is about 3.4 mm wider and 2.5 mm taller.

Drawn as the chip, the field comes out too small: it falls 1.7 mm short on the left and right and 1.2 mm short at the top and bottom. Art placed “just clear” of it ends up under the gold. At least one published card-face specification makes this mistake, labeling the field as the chip’s width and height.

A second error travels with copied contact tables: C8 printed as 28.85–28.55 mm from the top. That range runs backwards, so it cannot be right. C8 sits in the same row as C4, 26.85–28.55 mm from the top.

What do the chip contacts C1 to C8 do?

Five contacts do the work on most cards: power, ground, reset, clock and data. Designers rarely need the details, but they explain why 6-pin chips exist.

Do you need a 6-pin or an 8-pin chip?

Your card supplier decides that by the chip module it uses; for artwork, what changes is the plate. A 6-pin chip has no C4 and C8, so its contact field ends 26.01 mm from the top instead of 28.55 mm, and its plate is centered 1.27 mm higher. Payment cards use both kinds, and both fit the same readers. If you do not know which module is coming, keep artwork clear of the 8-pin plate plus 2 mm.

How much clear space does artwork need around the chip?

Leave 2 mm on every side of the plate. For an 8-pin chip, keep text and logos out of the area 6.56–23.56 mm from the left edge and 15.99–31.79 mm from the top.

Issuers and printer makers ask for this margin. MagTek’s card design recommendations make the blocking region around the chip 2 mm larger than the chip on all sides, and Stripe’s card artwork templates ask for at least 2 mm between artwork and chips, holograms, signature panels and stripes. On a factory card, the pocket for the chip is milled through the printed surface and the plate covers what is left, so a background can run underneath but nothing readable should.

Desktop card printers are stricter. Evolis says “Never print over the chip” and warns that doing so may damage the chip permanently. HID asks you to “design the card with white space surrounding the chip”, because a chip that sits slightly above the surface spoils the color transfer around it. Zebra says to be sure “the printing will not be on the contact area”. Their drivers also offer presets that keep print or the clear protective overlay off the chip area.

Cards with an antenna inside have one more zone to respect: the coil runs near the card’s edges, and metallic inks or foil over it can weaken the signal. Does foil interfere with NFC or RFID cards? covers that risk.

Where is the chip on a vertical card?

Turn the card a quarter turn clockwise and the chip ends up at the top, right of center. On a portrait front, the 8-pin plate sits 8.56–21.56 mm from the top edge and 24.19–35.99 mm from the left edge. A 6-pin plate sits 9.56–20.56 mm from the top and 27.21–35.51 mm from the left.

Payment card layouts for vertical cards put the chip at the top in the same way. The magnetic stripe, on the back, then runs down the right-hand long edge as seen from the front. The card itself does not change size: see CR80 card size for the portrait dimensions in millimeters and pixels.

What was the AFNOR chip position?

AFNOR, named after the French standards body, was an older, higher chip position that ISO allowed until 1990. Its contacts sat 10.16 mm (0.400 in) closer to the top edge, about 9.07 to 18.39 mm down, with the layout turned upside down so that C1 was at the bottom right.

That put the chip behind the magnetic stripe on the back of the card, which is why it was dropped. The 1999 edition of ISO/IEC 7816-2 kept it only in an informative annex, for the terminals already installed. Some printer drivers still offer an AFNOR chip preset, but new cards use the ISO position.

How close can embossing come to the chip?

Very close. Under ISO/IEC 7811-1, the area for the raised card number may reach up to 29.95 mm from the top edge, just 0.16 mm below the bottom of an 8-pin plate. The number line itself is centered 32.56 mm from the top, and its first digit is centered 10.18 mm from the left edge, directly under the chip.

There is no spare room. Keep the chip and the embossed number at their standard positions, and never emboss across the plate.

How do you check chip clearance on your own design?

Put the artwork on a true-size template and look at the plate and its keep-clear zone together. The free CR80 card template and artwork checker overlays either plate at the positions above and flags text or logos under it. To see how the gold plate sits in the finished design, add a 6-pin or 8-pin chip in the free 3D credit card mockup generator and turn the card in the light. For the stripe on the back, see magnetic stripe dimensions.

If you produce smart cards for customers, ProofScene turns your production proof-sheet PDF into an interactive 3D proof, chip and all, that the customer can turn over before signing off. See card and credential proofing or try it with a free account.