This isn't surprising, but it's unfortunate -- Apple still hasn't even opened up CoreNFC on the Watch.

I have a custom app for my business which uses NFC, and it's a bummer that iPads, and just about no modern Android tablets have NFC, so while I'd love to use a tablet to do certain tasks, I can't.

What’s your use case? I’m imagining people holding a 12in iPad by a door keypad or Apple Pay terminal fumbling around trying to find where the sensor is (I’m not being very creative with this I realize)

Our coffee machine isn't free anymore because of extensive usage, but we can pay with any NFC ID we register. My primary use case for an iPad is as a coffee coaster too, perfect synergy.