QR Code Generator

What can I encode in a QR Code?

Just about any text fits in a QR Code: website URLs, social media links, email addresses, phone numbers, messages, physical addresses, even Wi-Fi credentials. Most smartphones read the code straight from the camera.

You'll find them on digital menus, business cards, product packaging, marketing campaigns, electronic tickets and Pix payments.

The QR Code is built entirely in your browser. You can download it as a high-quality PNG image, ready to print or use digitally.

How a QR Code is built

The QR Code (Quick Response code) was invented by Masahiro Hara at Denso Wave in 1994 to track car parts on Toyota assembly lines. The format was opened as ISO/IEC 18004 in 2000 and the current edition is ISO/IEC 18004:2024. Unlike a 1D barcode, a QR is a 2D matrix of black and white modules with three large "finder" squares in the corners that let a scanner locate and rotate the code in any orientation.

There are 40 versions, ranging from Version 1 at 21×21 modules to Version 40 at 177×177. Each version adds 4 modules per side. Capacity also depends on what you encode: numeric mode packs 3 digits per 10 bits, alphanumeric handles 45 characters per 11 bits, byte mode stores 8 bits per character (used for URLs and UTF-8), and kanji mode covers Shift-JIS in 13 bits per character. A Version 40 code at the lowest correction level fits up to 7,089 digits, 4,296 alphanumeric characters, or 2,953 bytes.

Error correction levels

QR codes use Reed-Solomon error correction in four levels: L recovers up to 7% of damaged modules, M up to 15%, Q up to 25%, and H up to 30%. Higher protection means less room for data — moving from L to H on Version 40 cuts numeric capacity from 7,089 to 3,057 digits, a 57% reduction. Use M as a sensible default; bump to Q or H if the code will be printed on packaging that may scuff, or if you plan to overlay a logo in the centre (the masked area must fit inside the error budget).

Print size matters as much as version. A common rule of thumb is the 10× rule: the scanning distance should be about 10 times the side length of the symbol. A 2 cm QR scans well from roughly 20 cm; a billboard QR at 1 m can be read from across the street. Always preserve a quiet zone of at least 4 modules of white space around the code — scanners use it as a frame reference.

FAQ

What can a QR Code store besides a URL? Anything that fits as text: Wi-Fi credentials (WIFI:T:WPA;S:ssid;P:pwd;;), vCard contacts, calendar events, SMS templates, Pix payment payloads (in Brazil), Bitcoin URIs, even plain notes.

Can I put a logo on top? Yes — use error correction level Q or H and keep the logo to under about 25% of the code area, ideally centred. The Reed-Solomon redundancy will reconstruct the masked modules.

Do QR Codes expire? Static codes never expire — the data is encoded directly in the pattern. "Dynamic" QR services that show a short link first will stop working if the redirection service goes offline.

Is generating QR Codes free of royalties? Denso Wave holds the patent but has officially waived royalties for QR Code use since the format was opened, which is why it became the de facto 2D code standard worldwide.