Turn a link into a QR code.

Your URL's length decides whether the print job works

This is the single most useful thing to know about link codes, and it is invisible until something fails in the field. Every character of the URL is encoded into the pattern, so the address you paste directly sets how fine the grid is, and a fine grid needs a bigger printed size to stay readable.

The difference is not marginal. A short redirect might produce a 25×25 grid. The same destination with campaign parameters bolted on needs 53×53. Printed at the same width, that more than halves the size of every individual module, and small modules are what scanners fail on first, especially on matte stock, at an angle, or in bad light.

So strip the URL down to what's needed. Drop the tracking parameters, drop www. if your site works without it, drop trailing slashes and session junk. If you can see the difference in the preview above as you edit, so can a phone camera.

See why dense codes fail for what's physically happening when a code doesn't scan.

You still need campaign tracking. Don't put it in the pattern.

The reason people paste 200-character URLs into QR generators is UTM tags, and the instinct is right: you should know which poster worked. The mistake is encoding them, because that pushes the density cost onto the printed artifact for a benefit that has nothing to do with printing.

A dynamic code solves this properly: the printed pattern holds a short redirect, and the campaign parameters live on the destination, which you can change whenever you like. Your analytics see exactly what they saw before. The code stays coarse, robust, and cheap to print small. You also get scan counts, which a static code can never give you, because a static code never contacts anyone.

Dynamic codes are available on every signed-in plan, including the free one.

Include the scheme

Type or paste the full address including https://. Without a scheme, scanners disagree: some infer a web address correctly, some display the raw text and do nothing at all, and you find out which after it is printed on five thousand flyers.

Use https rather than http. Both encode identically, but browsers increasingly interrupt plain HTTP with a security warning, and a warning screen is a poor first impression for something someone just scanned off a poster.

Where a link code earns its place

Anywhere the action you want is "look at this specific page" and typing is the obstacle: posters, packaging, table talkers, business cards, vehicle livery, print ads, product manuals, review cards, conference signage, shelf edging.

The most common and most expensive mistake is pointing it at a homepage. If a poster is about one product, send people to that product. Every navigation step between the scan and the thing they were promised is somewhere to lose them, and they are standing in a corridor holding a phone, and they will not persevere.

Frequently asked questions