Why Microchip Your Pet
1 in 3 pets go missing. More than 80% are never found.
A microchip is a passive RFID transponder about the size of a grain of rice, implanted under the skin between the shoulder blades. It has no battery, no power source, and no GPS. It stores exactly one thing: a unique identification number that a scanner can read when held within a few inches of your pet.
Unlike a collar or a tag, it cannot fall off, fade, or be removed. That permanence is the entire point — and it is also why the number on its own is not enough.
What a microchip actually does
A microchip gives your pet one permanent, unchangeable identifier. When a vet or shelter scans a found animal, the scanner displays that number. The number is then looked up in a registry, and the registry returns your contact details.
That is the whole chain. Three links — break any one of them and your pet does not come home.
1. Chip
One permanent, unchangeable identifier under the skin.
2. Number
What the scanner displays when a vet or shelter scans a found animal.
3. Registry record
Where the number is looked up — and what returns your contact details.
What a microchip does not do
A microchip cannot track your pet. It has no battery and no GPS. It transmits nothing on its own — it only responds when a scanner powers it from a few inches away. There is no app that shows you where your pet is, and no phone that can read one.
This matters because it is the most common and most costly misunderstanding in pet ownership. A microchip is not a locator. It is an identifier that works after someone has already found your pet.
Why registration is the part that actually matters
An unregistered microchip returns a number that leads nowhere. The scan works, the number displays, and the trail stops.
This is the single most common failure. A pet is chipped at the shelter or the vet, the owner is handed a number, and the registry record is either never completed or never updated after a move, a new phone number, or a change of owner.
A chip is only as good as the record behind it, and the record is only as good as the registry’s ability to be found and reached.
Look up a microchip number · Which registries are legitimate
The scanner problem nobody mentions
Pet microchips operate on more than one frequency — 125 kHz, 128 kHz, and 134.2 kHz, the last being the ISO 11784/11785 international standard. A scanner that does not read the frequency of the chip in your pet will report “no chip found.”
Not because there is no chip. Because that scanner cannot hear it.
This is why a pet can be scanned, declared unchipped, and rehomed while a working microchip sits under its skin. It is the reason universal scanning matters, and it is the problem Peeva was built around.
How to scan a dog’s microchip · Universal microchip scanners
Reasons people give for not microchipping, answered
“It will hurt.”
The chip is implanted with a needle, comparable to a routine vaccination. No anesthetic is required and no surgery is involved. Most animals react to it the way they react to a shot.
“It’s a health risk.”
Adverse reactions are uncommon. The ones that do occur are usually minor — temporary swelling at the injection site, or the chip migrating a short distance from where it was placed. Migration affects readability, not health, and is one more reason to have your pet scanned at every vet visit.
“It tracks my pet, and that means it tracks me.”
It does not. The chip stores a number and nothing else — no name, no address, no location history, no GPS. It is inert until a scanner is held against it.
Side effects of microchipping · Microchips have no privacy or health risk
Common questions
Where is a microchip placed in a dog?
Under the skin, between the shoulder blades. Exactly where it goes.
Does microchipping hurt?
It is comparable to a routine vaccination. No anesthetic is needed.
Can a phone read a pet microchip?
No. Phones cannot read pet microchips. There is no scanner app, on any platform. Reading a chip requires a dedicated RFID scanner.
Does a microchip need to be updated?
The chip itself never changes. Your registry record does — after a move, a new phone number, or a change of owner.
What happens if my pet’s microchip isn’t registered?
A scan returns a number with no owner attached. The finder has an identifier and no way to reach you.
What does registering with Peeva cost?
$54.95 per year, or $249 for the lifetime of the pet.
More microchip questions — frequency, standards, lifespan, medical records — are answered in the Microchips section of the FAQ.
