Krane vs Haystack

Haystack is a digital business card platform. Its core is the card you share: by QR code, link, email, text message or NFC, to people who don’t need the app, with an email signature to match. Companies roll it out through an admin dashboard, HR sync and single sign-on, and admins can see the cards employees share with the company. The paper card scanner is one feature of that platform, included in the free plan.

Krane is a scanner. It reads business cards and event badges on iPhone, iPhone Duo and iPad, files them under the event you are at, and gets them out again: to Apple Contacts, a vCard, a CSV file or a CRM. It has no digital card to hand out, no web app and no team dashboard.

The difference is in kind: Haystack is a card you give, with a scanner attached. Krane is a business card scanner for the cards and badges you are given.

Haystack reads a photo of one card, one or both sides; its help center says it uses optical character recognition. You confirm the email, then can send the person your own digital card. Its FAQ says it reads cards in more than 25 languages. Haystack’s pages don’t say whether the reading happens on the phone or on a server, and don’t mention scanning several cards in one photo.

Krane’s camera has two modes. “Card or badge” shoots each card as soon as it is still, so you lay cards on the table one after another and it reads each while you set down the next. Free users can scan three in a row per session. “Group of cards”, with Krane Pro, reads a whole spread from one photo. Add the back of a card and both sides go into one contact. Krane reads almost any language and script, including Japanese, Chinese and Korean, and adds a Latin spelling for names in another script.

The scan limits differ most. Haystack’s Personal plan lists unlimited card scans. Krane is free for 10 scans in a rolling seven-day week; Krane Pro removes the limit. Someone who scans 30 cards once a month and never exports them pays nothing with Haystack and hits Krane’s free limit at the tenth card.

Show badges carry a code, usually QR, PDF417 or Aztec, and the printed name, title and company. Krane reads both and saves one contact. If the code holds a vCard, an email or a phone, it is merged with the printed details; if it holds only an attendee number, you still get the name, title and company from the print. Some shows encrypt their badge codes so only the official lead retrieval app can read them. Krane can’t decode those, and still saves the printed name, title, company and event. Haystack’s pages don’t mention badge scanning or reading other people’s QR codes.

In Krane you start an event when you arrive, and every card and badge is filed under it, with “Met at” and the event’s tags filled in. The event screen lists its cards and companies and exports them in one go. Haystack groups scanned cards with hashtags in the notes and sorts by company; its pages don’t describe an event feature.

Krane reads each card on your iPhone right away and checks it again when you’re back online. Haystack’s pages don’t say how it behaves with no connection. The badge scanner page lists every code type Krane reads; trade show lead capture covers the booth day.

Haystack connects to Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics and HubSpot on a paid plan. Its FAQ says Business and Enterprise; its pricing page lists CRM integrations from Pro, so check the plan before you buy. It also lists Zapier, webhooks and a public REST API, without saying which plan includes them. CSV or Excel export, of all contacts, the last 30 days or a date range, is on paid plans only.

Krane syncs with HubSpot, Salesforce and Pipedrive with Krane Pro, straight from the app; the tokens stay on your iPhone. HubSpot gets a contact, updated if one with the same email exists. Salesforce gets a Lead or a Contact, your choice, with the event, where you met, tags and notes in the Description field. Pipedrive gets a person, linked to an organization with the card’s company name, and a note carrying the event and your tags. The webhook posts each card as JSON to a URL you choose (Zapier, Make, n8n), signed with a shared secret. Send one card, a selection, a whole event, or every new scan automatically. CSV export, of one event or all cards, is also Pro.

Krane doesn’t connect to Dynamics 365, and Haystack doesn’t list Pipedrive.

Haystack’s prices, as listed on November 8, 2026: Personal is free. Pro is $7.95 per user a month, or $4.50 per user a month billed annually. Business is $4.95 per user a month, or $2.50 billed annually, each with a 14-day trial. Enterprise is usage based, through sales. The pricing page shows a dollar sign without naming the currency.

Krane is free for 10 scans a week. Krane Pro is $11.99 a month or $95.99 a year (US), billed through the App Store, with no trial; the free plan is how you try it. The App Store shows the price for your account and country. The pricing page lists everything Pro adds.

Haystack keeps contacts in a cloud account, synced across your devices and the web, with automatic backup. Its help pages don’t name the provider or the region. Its pricing page lists a SOC 2 Type II report, and its FAQ says it doesn’t sell data to third parties. Its App Store privacy label lists contact info, contacts, user content, identifiers and usage data as linked to you.

Krane has no account. Cards and CRM tokens are stored on your iPhone, and you back everything up to one file you can restore on a new device. There is no cloud sync between an iPhone and an iPad; you move cards with that file. Each card is read on your iPhone first, right away, and checked again when you’re back online. Krane’s privacy label lists device ID, product interaction and purchase history.