RAIN Alliance, the non-profit industry organization supporting the development and adoption of UHF RFID, announced that 53.2bn RAIN tag chips/ICs were shipped globally in 2024.

RAIN technology connects billions of everyday items to the internet, enabling businesses to use RAIN readers to identify, locate, authenticate, and engage with products with an attached RAIN tag. The 2024 shipments figure reflects continued year-on-year market growth, with the scale of demand notably marked by a 54% increase in RAIN tag chip shipments in just two years.

“We’re continuing to see strong appetite for RAIN technology across various industries, as reflected by the 52.3 billion tag chips shipped in the last 12 months,” said Aileen Ryan, president and CEO of RAIN Alliance. “This is driven by a proliferation of use cases for RAIN technology, most notably, as businesses increasingly harness and expand their deployments in recognition of the wider sustainability benefits that RAIN can offer. Notable among these is RAIN’s capacity to act as a data carrier that enables compliance with the European Union’s incoming Digital Product Passport regulations.”

The RAIN Alliance was recently accepted as a liaison to the CEN/CENELEC JTC24 Committee and will support in the creation of standards for the Digital Product Passport Framework.

“With the rollout of RAIN-enabled enterprise mobile devices expected within a few quarters and consumer devices set to follow, we expect the RAIN technology market to continue its upwards trajectory in the coming years,” continued Ryan. “The RAIN Alliance is working to support and accelerate the integration of RAIN technology into mobile devices. We are committed to making RAIN-enabled mobile devices a reality, and enabling new enterprise, consumer and sustainability use cases that will change how we connect with items on a daily basis.”