QR codes on product packaging

A pack is read twice: once in the shop, and again at home when the buyer actually needs help. The second moment is where a code earns its place, so link to whatever someone holding the product is most likely to look for.

One code, one job. A pack with three codes asks the buyer to guess which one helps. If you need several destinations, link to one short product page that lists them.

Do not use the QR code as the only place for information that the law or safety requires on the pack itself. Treat the code as extra, not as a replacement for the label.

Packaging is the longest-lived print most businesses produce. Stock sits in warehouses, on shelves, and in kitchen drawers for years, and a printed code cannot be changed. Websites get rebuilt, shops change platforms, and product pages are deleted when a line is discontinued — each of which leaves a dead code in someone’s hand.

• Use your own domain. A link to a marketplace listing or a file-sharing service depends on someone else keeping it alive.
• Use a short, permanent path. Something like yourbrand.com/p/kettle2 that you commit to never deleting.
• Redirect from it if needed. If the real page moves, change the redirect on your server. The printed code keeps working, which is all the flexibility a dynamic code would give you, without a third-party subscription.
• Keep discontinued pages. A product you no longer sell still has owners who need its manual.

The code itself does not expire — a static code is just the URL in a pattern. What expires is the page behind it, or the redirect service in between. Do QR codes expire? covers how that happens.

Labels are small, and the minimum size of a code is set by the size of each module, not the square as a whole. Around 0.4 mm per module is a safe floor for ordinary printing. A short URL keeps the module count low, which is what lets a code go down to about 2 cm; a long URL with tracking parameters can double the density. The full calculation is in QR code size for printing.

Bottles, cans, and tubes

• Keep the code small relative to the curve. A code that wraps far around a narrow bottle bends its edges out of the camera’s view.
• Orient it so the curve runs along one axis. On a cylinder, the code bends left to right but stays flat top to bottom; avoid placing it on a shoulder or neck where it curves both ways.
• Favour the tall direction. On a narrow container, a code positioned on the flattest, straightest part of the body scans more reliably than a larger one wrapped around it.
• Test on the real container. A flat proof tells you nothing about how the code reads once wrapped.

Codes from this site use error correction level Q by default, which tolerates some distortion and damage. That margin is for scuffs and folds in use, not for a design that only barely scans when new; see error correction.

A scanner needs sharp dark modules on a light, even background. Packaging materials work against that in predictable ways.

Print methods vary in how precisely they hold small detail. Flexographic printing on corrugated board spreads more than offset or digital printing on coated stock, so codes on shipping boxes need more size than codes on a folding carton. Ask your printer for their minimum line width and keep each module comfortably above it.

• Supply the SVG so the printer gets sharp vector edges at any size.
• Keep the white quiet zone intact; do not let a panel edge, fold, or seam run through it.
• Stick to dark on light. Inverted or low-contrast codes fail on many phones; see QR code colors.
• Scan a press proof on the actual material, in shop lighting, with more than one phone.

A packaging QR code is not a retail barcode. The EAN or UPC barcode that tills scan at checkout still has to be there; the QR code sits alongside it for customers. QR code vs barcode explains the difference. Some industry schemes are moving towards QR codes that carry product identifiers as well as a web link, but that is a separate standard with its own rules, not something an ordinary URL code does.

Encode your product URL and download a vector file for the printer:URL to QR code