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QR code generator

Links, Wi-Fi, contact cards and email — drawn live as you type, in this page. No account, no redirect, no expiry date.

  • 0 uploads
  • No limits
  • No signup
  • Works offline
What should the code contain?

29×29 modules · error correction H

Five kinds of code

Link. The most common by far. Encodes a URL directly, so scanning opens it. Shorter URLs make sparser, more reliable codes — a 40-character link produces a noticeably easier code to scan than a 200-character one with tracking parameters attached.

Text. Anything at all. Scanning shows the text; what happens next is up to the scanning app.

Wi-Fi. Encodes network name, security type and password in the WIFI: format that iOS and Android both understand natively. Scanning offers to join the network. This is the single most useful QR code most people ever print.

Contact card. A vCard with name, organisation, phone, email and website. Scanning offers to add a contact. Useful on business cards and conference badges.

Email. A mailto: link with subject and body pre-filled. Scanning opens a composed draft.

Error correction, and why it is at H

QR codes carry Reed–Solomon error correction, at one of four levels:

Level Recoverable Typical use
L ~7% maximum data, pristine conditions
M ~15% the common default
Q ~25% industrial, dirty environments
H ~30% logos, damage tolerance

This generator uses H unconditionally. It makes the code slightly denser for the same content, and in exchange the code survives a logo in the middle, a coffee ring, a crease in the paper, and being photographed at an angle in bad light. For a code that will exist in the physical world, that trade is worth making every time.

Printing them

Two rules cover most failures.

Size. The rough guideline is that scanning distance is about ten times the code’s width. A 2 cm code works at 20 cm — a business card. A poster read from three metres needs a code around 30 cm across.

Quiet zone. The blank margin around the code is part of the specification, not decoration. Scanners use it to find the code’s boundary. Four modules’ width is the standard minimum, and the margin setting here defaults to that. Do not crop it away.

Everything happens here

The QR matrix is computed in this page and drawn as SVG. Your Wi-Fi password, your phone number and the link you are encoding are never transmitted anywhere — which is not true of most free QR generators, several of which quietly route every code through their own redirect domain so they can count scans and, sometimes, sell the destination later.

How it works

  1. 01Pick what the code should containA link, plain text, Wi-Fi credentials, a contact card or a pre-filled email.
  2. 02Fill in the fieldsThe preview redraws on every keystroke, so you can see immediately when the code gets denser.
  3. 03Style itChoose colours, rounded or square modules, and drop a logo into the middle if you want one.
  4. 04DownloadPNG at 512, 1024 or 2048 pixels, or SVG for print and unlimited scaling.

Questions people actually ask

Will the code stop working after some time?
No. The code encodes your content directly — the URL you typed is literally what is stored in the pattern. There is no redirect through our domain, no short link, and nothing that can expire or be switched off. Codes made here work forever, including after Filestay does not exist.
Are you tracking scans?
We cannot. Tracking scans requires routing them through a server, which requires a redirect link, which is exactly what this tool does not create. If you need scan analytics, you need a dynamic QR service — and you should understand that it can also change where your code points, later.
How large can the logo be before the code stops scanning?
Error correction is fixed at level H, which reconstructs the code with up to about 30% of it obscured. The logo here covers roughly 22%, which leaves comfortable headroom. Always test the printed result with two different phones before ordering a thousand of them.
PNG or SVG?
SVG for anything that will be printed, put on a sign, or scaled — it is vector and stays perfectly sharp at any size. PNG for anything that needs to be an image file: slides, documents, social posts, some print shops that will not take vector.
Is the Wi-Fi password safe to put in a QR code?
The password is stored in the code in plain text, so anyone who can photograph the code can read it. That is fine for a guest network printed on a card in your café; it is a bad idea for the network your servers are on.
Does colour matter?
Yes. Scanners need contrast between the modules and the background, and they expect dark on light. Inverting it — light modules on a dark background — fails on many readers. Keep a contrast ratio of at least 4:1 and always keep the quiet zone around the edge.

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