You asked if our artistic QR codes actually scan. So I built a feature to prove it.
A few weeks ago I shared NGQRCode here, and one of the biggest questions I kept getting was:
“Sure, artistic QR codes look interesting; but do they actually scan reliably?”
That was a fair question.
Making an artistic QR code is one thing. Making one that still works reliably across different phones, lighting conditions, angles, and levels of visual complexity is a much harder problem.
So I decided to build something around it instead of just saying “trust me.”
NGQRCode now lets you control the QR code's error correction level:
Low
Medium
Quartile
High
The higher the error correction, the more damage/visual distortion the QR code can tolerate while remaining recoverable.
I added this because different use cases need different tradeoffs. Someone printing a simple QR code may want one setting, while someone creating a highly artistic design may want more tolerance.
This is still something I'm actively improving, but I wanted to share the update because the feature came directly from feedback here.
What would you want to see before trusting an artistic QR code for a real campaign?
For a printed campaign, I'd want to try the finished design at its actual print size with a phone before ordering a batch. A printable sample would help me much more than choosing an error-correction level I don't yet understand.
Error correction is something users shouldn’t have to understand just to know whether their QR will work.
I’m thinking the next step should be making this more practical: show the generated QR at its intended print size and make it easy to test before someone commits to printing hundreds or thousands of copies.
The scanability proof is useful, but the stronger signal is whether it changes real campaign behavior. Are users actually putting these artistic QR codes into live campaigns where reliability matters?
A QR can scan perfectly in a demo and still be a bad product if nobody is confident enough to use it in a real campaign.
I’m trying to get more real-world usage now, especially on things like posters, packaging and printed marketing materials. That should tell me much more than just lab-style scan testing
That makes sense. Real-world usage should tell you much more than another round of scan testing.
The key question then becomes what that usage would actually change for NGQRCode — what would you need to see in those campaigns to decide which customer/use case is worth making the primary commercial focus?
This comment was deleted 5 days ago