If you have an iPhone 11 or higher with iOS 13.1 or higher, you can now use NFC tags with your iPhone to trigger iOS automations (not SmartThings automations). This opens up all kinds of integration possibilities.
(Android users have been able to do this for quite a while, but iOS users didn’t have a good way of programming the NFC tags. Now it’s super easy. Also note that this will only work with an iPhone, not an iPad, and it has to be one of the newer models.)
Also, a cool feature is that you can set up an automation that will work for everyone on your home account or set up personal automations so that the same NFC tag will do different things for different household members.
See the example video at the always helpful HomeKit news
And here’s the community FAQ on using iOS shortcuts to trigger IFTTT applets or a Webcore call, which gives you smartthings integration.
I think this will work from the new NFC menu, but I haven’t tested it to be sure.
The delay mentioned is because of the cloud. The other alternative would be to use the native iOS automation to turn on a hue bulb as a physical proxy. that should run very fast.
Thanks, I have corrected this above. Some of the initial reports did not distinguish between being able to read the NFC tags and being able to write them.
