The card itself is purchased (with no travel enabled) for a one-time fee of €5 at staffed ticket counters, and is sold together with a cardboard wrapper and a plastic holder.

Navigo Découverte permits the user to travel on metros, trams, local RER trains, and busses within the greater Paris area.

Since 20 May 2006, it has been possible to use the card in all means of transport and in the entirety of the Île-de-France region in place of the magnetic paper tickets of the conventional Carte orange, which was completely discontinued in February 2009.

In July 2007, the Navigo card became compatible with Vélib', the bicycle-sharing system of the City of Paris.

On 9 December 2013, the Navigo card was redesigned by Philippe Starck and used NFC technology instead of RFID.

[5][6] Since 1 January 2018, it is possible to load daily tickets (which in paper form were called Mobilis) onto Navigo cards.

Based on tests starting in July 2018 (then restricted to 8,000 users with Samsung Galaxy phones operated by Orange), from 25 September 2019, it became possible to pay for and load tickets on Navigo cards using the NFC functionality on smartphones.

[7] Alternatively, Android & iOS smartphones, as well as select Wear OS and watchOS smartwatches, have since been able to be used to directly validate a ticket at turnstiles.