If a QR code that used to work now shows an error, an advert or a “subscription expired” page, it’s almost certainly a dynamic code. Dynamic codes don’t contain your link: they contain a short link to the QR company’s server, which forwards people to you, for as long as the company keeps doing it. A static code contains your link itself and keeps working forever. The JFDI QR code maker only makes static codes.
Static and dynamic codes
| Static code | Dynamic code | |
|---|---|---|
| What’s inside the code | Your actual link, Wi-Fi details or text | A short link to the QR company’s server |
| Works if the company closes or you stop paying | Yes, forever | No |
| Can be tracked (how many scans, where, when) | No | Yes |
| Can show adverts or a landing page first | No | Yes |
| Can change the destination after printing | No | Yes |
Dynamic codes are a real product with real uses, such as campaign tracking. The problem is that many sites offering “free QR codes” make dynamic ones by default, without making the catch clear.
What QR companies say themselves
You don’t have to take our word for it. One vendor, Uniqode, writes that dynamic codes “can expire when a subscription lapses, a monthly scan limit is reached”, and that free dynamic codes “expire when the free trial ends or when a monthly scan limit is reached” (Uniqode). Another, QRStuff, says that when a paid subscription expires, “a 50 scans/month limit is automatically applied to each code” (QRStuff).
The printed code looks exactly the same either way. You only find out when a customer tells you the code on your menu, poster or packaging doesn’t work.
How to tell which kind you have
Point your phone’s camera at the code and look at the link it shows before you open it:
- Your own website’s address, such as
yourcafe.co.uk/menu: it’s static. It will work as long as that page exists. - Someone else’s short address, often a QR company’s domain or an unfamiliar short link: it’s dynamic, and it depends on that company.
How to fix a dead code
You can’t revive a dynamic code without paying the company that controls its redirect. Your options:
- Pay to reactivate it, if reprinting would cost more.
- Replace it with a static code pointing straight at your page, and reprint.
- Cover it with a sticker of a new static code, as a quick fix for menus and posters.
Making a code that won’t expire
- Open the QR code maker and choose what the code opens: a link, Wi-Fi, a contact card, an email, a phone call or a text message.
- Enter the details. The code updates as you type.
- Style it if you like, with colours, rounded dots and a logo. The notes under the preview warn you about anything that could stop it scanning.
- Download a PNG, SVG or PDF. Use SVG or PDF for print.
- Test it with two or three phones before you print lots.
There’s no sign-up, no watermark and no limit, and the codes are yours to use commercially. Because the code holds only what you typed, nobody, including us, can see when or where it’s scanned.
The one thing to plan for
A static code can’t be changed after it’s printed. If the destination might change, such as a menu, a price list or an event page, point the code at a page on your own website that you can update, such as yourcafe.co.uk/menu, rather than at a PDF file whose address may change. You get the flexibility of a dynamic code without depending on anyone else.