SMS QR code generator
A code that opens a text message to your number with the wording already written.
- Free to use
- No account needed
- Tested before you download
- Ready to print
Step 1
What should this code do?
Starts a text message
Include the country code for international use.
Pre-fills the text. The sender can still edit it.
Step 2 · Make it yours (optional. A plain code works great.)
Colour
Every one of these is dark enough to survive print. Pick one, or set your own below.
Codes with a label are scanned noticeably more often than bare ones.
A logo covers modules. We raise error correction to compensate and then decode the finished code to confirm it still reads.
Higher settings keep the code readable even if it gets scuffed or partly covered, but pack the dots tighter. Standard is right for almost everyone.
Step 3
We’ll tell you exactly how big to print it so it scans easily from that distance.
Common questions
- Will the text message open on every phone?
- On the widest range we know of. There are two competing ways to put a text message in a QR code, and we use the one more phones and scanner apps read correctly, so the message opens reliably rather than on some devices only.
- Does scanning the code send the text automatically?
- No. It opens the messaging app with your number and wording already filled in. The person reviews it and taps send themselves, which is both expected behaviour and a safeguard against a code firing a message without consent.
Before you print
Size is the most common failure, but it is not the only one.
- Test the actual print, not the screen
- Scan it from the physical proof, at the distance and in the lighting people will really use, with an older phone if you have one. A code that scans on a monitor can fail on paper.
- Keep the quiet zone empty
- The blank margin around the code is part of the code. Scanners use it to find the edges. Placing text or a border inside it is the most common design mistake.
- Avoid glossy lamination where you can
- Gloss reflects overhead light straight back into the camera and washes out the pattern. Matt finishes scan far more reliably indoors.
- Do not print on a curve if you can avoid it
- Bottles, cups and cylinders distort the pattern. If you must, keep the code small relative to the curve and use a higher error correction level.
- Tell people what they get
- A code with no label is scanned far less often than one that says what happens next. 'Scan to see the menu' outperforms a bare code consistently.