QR codes on retail products that scan at the till
4 July 2026
These days a product often carries two QR-ish codes: one that markets it, one that sells it. They look identical — square grids of squares — but they do completely different jobs. Mix them up on a packaging print run and it gets expensive. Here's the split.
Two codes, two jobs
- The marketing QR. Points at a landing page, a how-to video, a sign-up form, a re-order link. It's for engagement, and any decent QR does it. It's entirely yours.
- The checkout code. The one that beeps at the till. It has to carry the product's identity in a form the shop's till understands, and it has to scan on the scanners the shop already owns.
Work out which one you're making before you design a thing.
What "scans at the till" actually needs
Retail checkout is shifting from the old stripey barcode (the EAN/UPC lines) to 2D barcodes — often a QR carrying a GS1 Digital Link. That's a structured URL holding the product's GTIN, and it can tuck in batch, expiry, and serial data too, while still opening a web page for the shopper. Retailers are working toward taking these at the till, a switch the industry calls Sunrise 2027.
Here's the bit that matters to you: a checkout code isn't just "a QR with a link in it." It has to follow the GS1 structure, encode a valid GTIN, and pass tests on real retail scanners. Not a DIY job.
Need codes that scan at the till? That's what our sister project 2DReady.com is built for — GS1-compliant 2D barcodes for retail and point-of-sale. Right tool, right job.
When a plain QR is all you need
Loads of on-product codes never go near a till scanner. For those, a standard QR from bulkqr is spot on:
- Campaign and landing-page links
- How-to and setup videos
- Registration, warranty, and re-order pages
- Provenance and authenticity stories
That's your case? Then you don't need GS1 anything. You need a clean code that scans, and ideally one that carries your brand.
Printing on products
Whichever code it is, packaging is a rough neighbourhood for a QR:
- Quiet zone. Keep the clear margin — packaging art loves to crowd it.
- Curved surfaces. A bottle or tube warps the grid. Give it room, don't go tiny.
- Small SKUs. On a little item the code still has to hit a minimum size to scan. Plan the layout round it.
- Error correction. Push it up for handling, scuffing, and curves — the why is in what makes a good QR code.
Across your whole range
A marketing code per product is a bulk job. Export your product list and generate a code for every SKU in one pass — the CSV walkthrough shows how. Design once, download the set, hand it to your packaging team.
Marketing codes across your range? Start with the generator. Codes that scan at the till? Head to 2DReady.com.