Planar hexagonal broadband near-field antenna for UHF RFID application

In the design of ultra-high-frequency (UHF) radio frequency identification (RFID) near-field antennas, realising an antenna with electrically large size, wide frequency band, and far read range has always been a challenge. To solve these problems, a planar hexagonal broadband near-field antenna for UHF RFID applications is proposed and investigated. The antenna structure is composed of six dipoles (resembles three sets of double-arrow structures) that are printed on the top and bottom surfaces of an FR4 substrate, forming a dual-layer (inner and outer layers) broken hexagonal loop. The 10 dB return loss bandwidth of the proposed antenna can reach up to 20.8% (856–1055 MHz), thus able to cover the entire European Telecommunication Standards Institute and Federal Communication Commission system operating bands. Since the current distribution along the loop is kept in a single direction and the length of each dipole is ∼1/2 wavelength (λ), strong and uniform z-component magnetic field distribution with an 18 cm read range can be obtained in the near-field zone of the antenna. As the proposed near-field antenna has a planar size of 175 mm × 175 mm, it is suitable for multi-system and wide-range RFID applications.