45 column cards were introduced by IBM around 1910 utilising a standard punch card size which had been used by their previous 36-column punch cards, 3¼" x 7⅜" (82.5mm x 187.3mm). These cards were punched with circular holes, with punching positions arranged in 12 rows, 45 columns with 5/32" (4mm) spacing between the centre of each column.

Their use was largely supplanted by the later 80-column cards that came to replace them in 1928. However, their production and use in the Soviet Union continued until the 1980s with multiple specimens dating from the late 1980s found in the archive.