What Are Metal Business Cards Made Of?

I've spent a long time telling people when metal is right and when they're better off with paper. This is the honest version: what the card actually is, how it's made, what it can't do, and who it's for.

Most business cards are paper: a 16pt card (about 350 gsm) is the everyday standard, and premium cards run 32pt to 48pt. The rest are cotton paper, plastic (PVC), solid wood or metal. Here's how they compare in the hand:

Every stainless card we sell, silver or colored, starts as a flat sheet of steel, laser cut to credit-card size: 85.6 × 54 mm, the ID-1 size of a bank card. That's slightly narrower and taller in proportion than a US paper card (3.5 × 2 in). Stainless is the right metal for a card because it's dense enough to feel serious, rigid enough not to bend in a wallet, doesn't rust, and takes a laser beautifully. It's the same family of alloys used for watch cases and kitchen hardware.

• 0.5 mm is our standard and the one I'd choose for most people. It's thinner than a plastic credit card (about 0.76 mm) but weighs about 18 g, roughly three or four plastic credit cards, or about ten times a standard paper card. You feel it the moment it lands in your palm.
• 0.8 mm is about credit-card thickness, stiffer, and weighs about 29 g. It lands on a table with an audible tap. Choose it when the card is the gift. It costs a little more, and a stack of them is heavy to carry.

Aluminum is our lightweight option. It takes engraving and color printing well and reads as metal the moment you touch it, but it's far lighter than steel: easier to carry a stack, less of a thud on the table. If you want a mirror face or the heavy 0.8 mm card, the configurator shows which metals offer them. I'd pick aluminum if you hand out dozens a night, and stainless if one card crosses a table and gets kept.

A silver card is bare stainless steel; that's the color of the metal. Every other color is PVD (physical vapor deposition): in a vacuum chamber, a thin metallic layer is deposited onto the steel and bonds to it. It isn't paint and it isn't a sticker. It's very hard and won't flake like paint does, and it's the same family of finish used on watch cases and designer taps. Two honest limits: a mirror surface still shows scratches over time, and the cut edge of every card is bare steel (we never paint metal edges, because paint chips in a wallet; a color rim goes on the face instead).

When the laser engraves a coated card, it burns through the color to the bright steel underneath. That's where metal contrast comes from: two tones, coating and steel, with no ink involved.

Copper business cards from us are stainless steel with a copper-tone PVD coating, not solid copper. That matters for two reasons:

• Solid copper is soft and darkens as it oxidises, so it browns in a pocket and marks with fingerprints.
• A copper-tone coating stays the same warm reddish-brown for years, on a steel card that doesn't bend.

Engraving reveals bright steel through the copper, a warmer contrast than black. Brushed copper looks earthier; mirror copper looks almost liquid. The same is true of brass tones: a coating, not the metal.

Every metal card includes laser engraving. On top of that you can add cut-outs, color printing, or both.

A focused laser burns your design into the surface. On a coated card it removes the color to show bright steel; on bare silver the marks read slightly darker than the metal around them. Run a fingertip across it and you can feel the line. It's precise, but it has a floor: text needs a cap height of about 1.5 mm (roughly 6 pt) and lines need to be at least 0.3 mm, or fine serifs start to break up. Engraving is on or off, so it can't do gradients, shading or photographs. Tone needs color printing.

A QR code can be engraved for a flat US$ 30 at any quantity. It scans best on matte or brushed black or matte silver, at about 2 cm square with a clear margin. Mirror reflects the phone camera, so avoid it for QR. We test-scan every QR at proof.

Engraving burns a line; etching removes a shallow layer of metal across an area, so a shape sits slightly below the surface. It's the metal equivalent of a deboss, and the way to get a "pressed" look on steel.

Here the laser goes all the way through, leaving a window the light falls through. On a table, a cut-out card throws its own shadow. It's the most architectural thing you can do to a card. The rule is structure: anything floating inside a cut (the middle of an O, the island of a monogram) falls out unless a small bridge ties it back, and we draw those bridges with you, because where they land changes how the mark reads. Keep cut-outs at least 2 mm from the edge, and leave enough steel that the card stays rigid; we'll tell you if a pattern takes too much. We check every cut-out design before production.

When the design needs real color (a gradient, a photo, a full-color logo), we print it onto the metal with UV-cured ink. It's the only way to get tone onto a metal card. The steel stays visible around and through the color, which gives printed areas a faint shimmer you don't get on paper: cooler on silver, warmer on gold. White PVD is the truest base when color accuracy matters. We match brand colors as closely as the process allows and show you on the proof. A common premium build: color on the front, contact details engraved on the back, one cut-out accent.

The fastest way to be disappointed by a metal card is to send it a design made for paper. Four things that don't carry over:

1. No foil stamping, letterpress or paper embossing. Those are paper processes: a hot die or an inked plate pressing into a soft sheet. Steel doesn't give. The metal versions: a mirror-polished panel for a "foil" look, a deep etch for a "deboss".
2. No painted edges. Paint on a steel cut edge chips in a wallet. Edges stay bare steel; if you want a colored border, it goes on the face as a thin rim.
3. No gradients in engraving. A laser mark is on or off. Gradients and photos need color printing.
4. Mirror fights small type and QR codes. The reflection drowns fine engraving and confuses phone cameras. Put type and QR on a matte or brushed area.

"Metallic business card" means two different things. One is a paper card with metallic foil: shiny, light, endlessly flexible in design. If that's what you want, see our metallic foil business cards. The other is a card made of metal, and designing for it is a different job. What translates:

Design rules, in short:

• Keep it simple and bold.
• Use the metal as the background color.
• Leave 2 mm of safe space at the edges (bleed is 1 mm on metal).
• Let one technique carry the idea.

Metal suits people who hand over a card rarely and on purpose:

• Real estate agents and brokers, where the card is part of the presentation at a showing or closing.
• Private and luxury services: trainers, private chefs, wealth advisors, concierge. The card should match the price of the service.
• Creative professionals, for whom the card is a small portfolio piece.
• Founders and executives who want the handover itself to start a conversation.
• Events and memberships: VIP invitations, member cards, launch keepsakes. Here the card is the experience.

Who metal isn't for:

• people who hand out 30+ cards a week;
• teams of 15+ (the total climbs fast; premium paper with foil or embossing is the better team buy);
• designs that live or die on a full-bleed photo.

Public house exercises from our case studies, not client work, each with its spec.

Upload your logo and our Studio shows you a concept on a black stainless card in a few minutes, with honest notes on what engraves cleanly and where a cut-out needs a bridge. A concept is a picture, not a print file: a person rebuilds your artwork and proofs it before anything is cut.

Metal cards take about three weeks after you approve your proof, plus transit. It's an estimate, not a delivery date. Laser time, coating, cutting, printing and inspection all scale with quantity, so 1,000 cards isn't the same job as 100. Tell us your date before you order and we'll say honestly whether it's realistic.

Metal is stricter than paper. A person checks every file before production: cap height about 1.5 mm (6 pt) and up, lines 0.3 mm and up, cut-outs bridged and 2 mm from the edge, and engraving, cutting and printing on separate layers. Most paper designs need some adjustment. We make it at no charge and tell you what changed; if a design needs real restructuring, we talk first. metal file requirements

Before anything is cut, you get a digital proof showing what will be engraved, cut and printed, and where. You approve it, or we revise until it's right.

Metal is heavy. A box of 100 cards at 0.5 mm is about 1.8 kg (4 lb) of steel before packaging, and about 2.9 kg at 0.8 mm. Cards ship in protective packaging so they don't scratch each other. Shipping is free within the continental US. We ship to 30+ countries; other destinations are quoted at checkout.

NFC lets a phone open your link with a tap. On metal it starts with an honest fact: solid steel blocks the signal. So our metal NFC business cards bond a stainless front to an NFC-enabled printed back. The chip sits in the back layer, and phones read it from that side. All-steel looks are possible with a pocket or window that lets the signal out; we quote those individually. NFC metal cards start at US$ 229 for 25.

The chip holds a link (a digital card, LinkedIn, a booking page), and you can change where it points without replacing the card. A phone reads it only from a few centimetres away, when someone chooses to tap.

Metal business cards start at US$ 230 for 5 and cost US$ 475 for 100 in silver stainless steel, engraved, with a free proof and free shipping within the continental US. For every quantity, color, finish and add-on, see how much do metal business cards cost.

Metal isn't an upgrade from paper. It's a different object with a different job. Premium paper is a world of craft: how foil catches light, how letterpress bites into cotton, how an embossed logo feels under a thumb. It offers far more finishes than metal, and it costs a fraction as much per card. Metal is a world of material surprise: weight, cold, rigidity, the sound it makes on a table.

A cotton card with gold foil and a blind emboss says "I care about craft." A gold metal card says "I care about impact." I'd keep a paper run for everyday handouts and a small metal run for the people who matter.