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Thirty years after the QR Code was invented, it&#;s now ubiquitous. But the prognosis of the technology wasn&#;t a launch-to-success story; it was one checkered with apprehensions. Yet, the QR Code emerged as reliable, every single time. This is a bird&#;s-eye-view of the fascinating history of QR Codes.
It all began in the s, at the heart of Japan&#;s bustling, post-war economy.
At that time supermarkets were sprawling everywhere, selling everything from groceries and electronics to pottery and concert tickets.
There were long queues in front of the stores, which reflected Japan&#;s (and the rest of the developed world&#;s) booming economy. But one group of people were the underdogs of this development: cashiers.
Cashiers were at the heart of the new wave of consumerism, manually keying prices in cash boxes for hundreds, potentially thousands of buyers every day.
However, working long hours and doing repetitive tasks impaired their physical and mental health. Reports of carpal tunnel syndrome&#;numbness caused by a pinched nerve in the wrist&#;among cashiers became widespread.
There were desperate calls by grocery retailers and packaged goods manufacturers to improve the cash counter flow at crowded retail outlets.
Machine-readable codes were available then, but none were suitable for small to mid-sized businesses for various reasons: complications of setting up and high maintenance costs.
International Business Machines (IBM) responded to the retail crisis by reinventing an existing machine-readable code used in the automotive industry to track car parts. It was the bull&#;s-eye code. In those days, the tech had limited use outside factory conveyor belts. But everything was about to change.
The circular bull&#;s-eye code was the predecessor of what would become the linear barcode. Image courtesy of ID History Museum via SmithsonianIBM engineer George Laurer reinvented the bull&#;s-eye code into the vertical one you see today: the bar code (now called barcode). It was designed to register product details with a specialized scanner.
IBM&#;s reinvention was hugely successful and would become a part of the Universal Product Code or UPC, the global standard for machine-readable codes. The Point-of-Sale (PoS) was also developed subsequently, IBM being one of the first PoS vendors&#;which further integrated barcodes into the commercial scene.
IBM engineer George J. Laurer reportedly went against his manager&#;s instruction to re-package the bull&#;s-eye code. Instead, he scrapped it for the linear barcodes you see today. Image courtesy of Al Santos/University of Maryland via NPRAt their behest, the barcode and PoS successfully sped up the customer flow at Japanese and Western supermarkets&#;this time without straining the cashiers. For the next two decades, barcodes will be an indisputable piece of technology in retail the world over.
In Japan, Denso Wave, a manufacturing technology company was one of the key players supplying integrated barcode systems, mainly to local industrial clients. But they also had a special project that was about to change retail history forever.
Between the s&#; and &#;70s, when the barcode was still being adopted in Japan, Denso Wave began getting requests from their industrial clients for an updated barcode.
Denso&#;s clients (some say it was a car maker and Denso&#;s parent firm, Toyota) wanted a machine-readable code to hold more information than barcodes&#; 20 alphanumeric character limit.
The oddity of barcodes was that manufacturers had to use a handful of them in one product to store all the information, which slowed down the scanning process.
One team member at Denso, named Masahiro Hara, took to finding an alternative to the barcode after the request. Some sources say Hara initially tried to increase the capacity of existing barcodes but without success.
Later, Hara struck up an idea for a new machine-readable code while playing the board game Go.
If you see a Go board, you will inadvertently notice the connection between what would become the QR Code. Image by Goban1 (via Creative Commons)Hara began working on the new code, this time not shaped like a bar but a square filled with a pixel-like pattern.
Barcodes were one-dimensional, and one had to scan them horizontally. Hara&#;s new code was scannable horizontally and vertically (hence two-dimensional). Being two-dimensional also meant the new code could store more data (+ alphanumeric characters) than the barcodes.
Soon, Hara&#;s team landed a successful iteration of a new machine-readable code. They named it the Quick Response Code or QR Code since it was tens of times faster than the barcode. The new code also worked even with 30% damage.
But there was one flaw: machines (cameras) took time or could not read the QR Codes amidst distractions or when scanned from an angle.
One day, while returning home, Hara noticed a building standing out from the rest. The scene lingered in his mind and sparked an idea to experiment with frames for QR Codes.
&#;At the top of the building was a geometric pattern that gave me the idea to create a 2D code that used a pattern,&#; Hara said. Then began a hunt to find a unique symbol that would help machines recognize a QR Code even amidst other elements such as images and texts.
During their research, the team found that machines could read code faster when some pattern was attached to the three corners. However, it was unclear which pattern they should use that is not in any other code.
To find a unique pattern, Hara and his team reportedly parsed dozens of symbolic and textual materials&#;magazines, newspapers, books, and periodicals&#;from around the world (using a special software they developed).
Finally, after three months, the team found a pattern that was not used anywhere else: it was squares (called eyes) in a unique ratio of black and white (1:1:3:1:1). That would become the position marker of QR Codes.
A QR Code has fixed patterns in three corners (called eyes), forming a right angle from every orientation. The design made QR Codes more easily and quickly scannable by machine. Image via Sprout QRThe final product was a game-changer two years later. The QR Codes solved all the erstwhile shortcomings of the barcode (mainly data storage and scanability) and had more in store for Denso&#;s clients.
In successive years, QR Codes would receive almost all the major industry-standard certifications in Japan and globally (including ISO).
Denso Wave publicly announced QR Codes in .
&#; Fun facts: During the development of QR Codes at Denso Wave, the early versions sometimes contained playful messages embedded within the QR Code intended for other engineers working on the project. We wonder what those messages were &#;
However, despite the groundbreaking success of QR Codes during in-house testing, they were only promoted within Denso&#;s existing manufacturing clientele. Denso downplayed the use of QR Codes among ordinary individuals and small businesses at that time despite being fully confident of the product.
In the early s, barcodes became ubiquitous in consumer goods. Japan&#;s (and the West&#;s) successful tryst with the technology was globally reported.
So much was the popularity of barcodes that the beeps of scanning at supermarkets defined the developed world in popular culture in some way.
But starting in the mid-s, barcodes began showing signs of needing an update. One of the most prominent shortcomings was the limited space to hold information: only 20 alphanumeric characters (slightly varying depending on the symbology used).
Barcodes&#; character limit worked in the s but not in the s when the need for data storage morphed from basic SKU numbers to in-depth product data. Moreover, many businesses in Japan wanted to use Kanji and other special characters, which barcodes didn&#;t support.
Barcodes also needed expensive point-of-sale equipment to scan, which was becoming increasingly unaffordable for the stream of early-stage businesses entering the scene.
Finally, with more people queuing up in the supermarkets, barcodes started to slow down check-outs since they had to be scanned from a specific direction to register the information. Worse: cashiers had to manually parse stock books to register a product if a barcode was damaged or unscannable.
Factory assembly lines that used barcode scanners also suffered from the same slowdown.
A slow supermarket queue was one thing. However, slow factory lines impacted the bottom line. Image via All About LeanA slow supermarket queue was an inconvenience to ordinary consumers. But for factory lines, it was a blow to the bottom line. Now widespread globally, the world was starting to realize the shortcomings of barcodes.
At that time, very few knew that back in , technology had already been created that nullified every shortcoming of the barcodes (cue: Denso&#;s underestimation). Moreover, it was something the automotive industry in Japan was already using.
In the years leading up to , a series of high-profile industrial and environmental mishaps led to widespread public concerns about food safety and supply-chain transparency.
In , the public discourse on food safety peaked in the West after an incident of BSE&#;commonly known as the &#;mad cow disease&#;&#;broke out in the UK.
Millions of cattle had to be put down due to fears of an outbreak. 179 people in the UK (and 53 others around the world) died of vCJD (the human equivalent to BSE) after eating the infected beef. What began as a local crisis in Britain would soon be found across the Pacific in the US, Japan, and elsewhere in the following years.
A &#;mad cow disease&#; outbreak in the UK stirred the public discourse of food safety where the beef was being imported. Image via RABDFThe spread of vCJD triggered political firestorms in the UK and countries where British beef was imported. It also led to import bans and public health clarion calls from governments and welfare groups worldwide. Suddenly, there were widespread demands to disclose the origin, source, and safety protocols for organic produce sold in markets.
Manufacturers and supply chains scrambled to find a way to make the entire journey of products, from farms to the table, transparent. With barcodes, manufacturers struggled to hold basic data, let alone end-to-end information on goods that the public could access.
QR Codes became the missing piece of the puzzle in that regard. Several factors made QR Codes the perfect technology needed for the time:
Want more information on Qr Code Based Access Control System? Feel free to contact us.
&#; Pixelated heroes?
Some reports attribute the Fukushima nuclear disaster to a watershed moment for QR Codes in Japan, which was to define the reliability of the tech to the world! During relief operations, Japanese authorities reportedly used QR Codes to track and manage aid materials, such as the origin and destination of food supplies.
Following the nuclear fallout, there was widespread skepticism about radiation contamination levels in food. People were refusing to buy food from retailers and trust the assurances that the food was safe. The erstwhile Japanese government stepped in and mandated QR Codes in packaging to disclose radiation contamination levels in food. The easy access to trusted test results helped the public navigate the skeptical times with some degree of assurance.
A core reason QR Codes became popular at that time of crisis was Denso Wave&#;s strategic decision to surrender patent rights on QR Codes despite holding them. Anybody could develop and use QR Codes without a license.
&#;It (making QR Codes open-source) was not a big debate internally,&#; Hara said in an interview. &#;It was the only way to get the standard adopted quickly by our customers and the rest of the business world.&#;
Soon, QR Codes became a fixture in Japanese and Western consumer products, thanks to their practicality and fit with the existing infrastructure.
A report found 66% of the merchants surveyed used QR Codes on printed materials. The same report said two out of five merchants used QR Codes on their marketing collaterals.
QR Codes have become a fixture in daily life and are widely used by businesses big and small. Image via UnsplashManufacturers began using QR Codes for inventory management and redirecting users to websites, coupons, and more. The public enjoyed quickly accessing product information directly from the packaging with a camera scan. This was the most significant shift from the barcodes that only held 20 alphanumeric characters.
In the years leading up to , more developers began releasing apps in app stores to scan QR Codes. For some time, downloading an app to read QR Codes was seen as a minor hurdle. But it was soon about to change.
The next big break for QR Codes came with Apple&#;s iOS 11 in . The OS made QR Code scanning a native feature in iPhone cameras. At the same time, Google made the same move on its erstwhile mobile OS, Android 8.0.
Two of the world&#;s biggest mobile OSs (by usage volume) making QR Code scanning native meant businesses could share information with end-users. For mobile users, it was like having tiny QR Code scanners in their pockets at all times.
In the years following Apple&#;s iOS 11 release, QR Codes grew in popularity by leaps and bounds in the US (North America and Europe mostly used QR Codes for non-payment purposes). Android&#;s stronghold in Asia, Latin America, and the rest of the world helped QR Codes catapult to the &#;global public code&#; stature.
China was one of the first nations to adopt QR Codes beyond the means it was originally created for. Image via CGTNIn China, QR Codes were already being used widely via their superapps such as Alipay and WeChat to do everything from making payments to hailing cabs, and others in between. Chinese billionaire Jack Ma, founder of Alipay, is often credited with pioneering the use of QR Codes for payment, something even Mr Hara had never thought possible.
A decade later, QR Codes were everywhere. They became so popular in some regions, that they were almost muscle memory for people in countries such as India (UPI), Brazil (PIX QR), Indonesia (QRIS), Singapore (SGQR), and China (Alipay and WeChat Pay). QR Codes are the default mode of online payment in these regions.
One of the 21st Century&#;s worst crises hit the world in . The COVID-19 pandemic was nothing the world was prepared for. The subsequent global lockdowns severely hit almost every industry.
The infectious nature of the disease pushed the world to contactless and touchless ways of engagement. The break that would make QR Codes a fixture in our lives was already there.
The COVID-19 pandemic made QR Codes ubiquitous. Image via UnsplashBusinesses that heavily depended on foot traffic and human contacts, such as restaurants, supermarkets, and ecommerce, began adapting QR Codes left, right, and center.
People began choosing QR Code-based alternatives en-masse, such as for payments and accessing menus, instead of making physical contact. The pandemic led to explosive and unequivocal QR Code adoption in the West.
&#; Can you believe it?
Masahiro Hara, who invented the QR Codes in the early &#;90s still works at Denso Corp., as a general engineering manager for QR Codes. According to a report, Mr. Hara plans to &#;develop new varieties of fruit and vegetables to make them more delicious&#; after retirement. (PS: Does that mean no more groundbreaking machine-readable codes from you, Mr. Hara? &#;)
Many governments such as India, South Korea, Australia, and Singapore began using QR Codes for COVID-19 contact tracing. In India, QR Code-based payment system called the UPI skyrocketed during the pandemic.
As of , Mr Hara and the Denso team are reportedly developing a new rectangular micro QR Code that can hold more data in a smaller physical footprint.
A bar graph showing an estimated number of QR Code users in the US over the years and a forecast for and . Image via StatistaForecasts suggest there will be 97.8 million QR Code scanners in in the US, which will grow to 100.2 million by .
What started as a passion project at Denso Wave in Japan is now a fixture in our daily lives. But despite the ubiquity, Denso Wave does not make a profit out of their brainchild.
&#;We don&#;t receive a commission each time it&#;s (QR Code) used,&#; joked Masahiro Hara in an interview with The Guardian newspaper in . &#;If only that were the case.&#;
The rest is history.
Author Details
Debayan Paul
Debayan is the Senior Editor at Uniqode. He oversees editorial production&#;from ideation to publication&#;across customer-facing channels. He also enforces the house style, tone, and voice across deliverables and vociferously lobbies for the Oxford comma.
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10min readYou&#;ve seen QR Codes everywhere, from billboards to print ads to virtual business cards and beyond. From scanning product labels to accessing event information, QR Codes have completely revolutionized the way consumers interact with information.
But where did they come from, and how do QR Codes work? Below, we&#;ll discuss their history, how they work, and some of the best modern use cases for these little pixelated square patterns.
Before we dive into the history of QR Codes, it&#;s worth taking a crash course in QR Codes basics to learn what exactly a QR Code is.
A Quick Response Code is quickly readable by a cell . Chances are you&#;ve seen and used them, but many people don&#;t know how they work and what happens behind the scenes when someone scans one.When someone scans a QR Code, it uses a combination of spacing as a type of Matrix barcode (a 2D barcode) to convey a multitude of information. As a result, QR Codes have a wide range of uses across all types of industries, such as retail, marketing, and logistics.
The modern-day QR Code consists of seven parts. Each creates a pixelated pattern that looks similar to a crossword puzzle. Each pixel&#;s placement has a specific purpose that conveys certain information through the code, such as the:
Despite their intricate structures, QR Codes can be surprisingly flexible depending on if they&#;re Static or Dynamic. In fact, weighing the differences of Static QR Codes vs. Dynamic QR Codes is a vital step toward using QR Codes to their fullest potential.
Static QR Codes permanently link QR Code readers to one link. The benefit of that permanence is that once a Static QR Code is printed, you don&#;t need any subscription or features to connect people to a page as long as it&#;s readable.
On the other hand, you can change a Dynamic QR Code&#;s destination link even after the code has been printed&#;no need to reprint and deploy all new codes.
On top of that, Dynamic QR Codes allow you to see statistics like how many people have scanned them. Although those features require a subscription, QR Code Generator&#;s Dynamic QR Codes give you actionable insights.
If you know where and when people are showing interest in your product, then you know how to invest your resources. This data can lead to greater return on investment (ROI), time savings, and customer insights that&#;s otherwise only available through trial and error.
While QR Codes and Barcodes are similar in practice, QR Codes contain more information because they have the ability to hold information both horizontally and vertically. Barcodes only use horizontal information. While Barcodes work wonderfully for situations like scanning supermarket items, QR Codes have a much higher capability of transferring information, likely what has made them increasingly popular due to their versatility.
Left side: QR Code, right side: bar code.Like the development of many technologies, QR Codes were created out of necessity. QR Codes actually started out as barcodes with their typical purpose: for supermarkets.
In the s, Japan experienced a wave of economic growth. Supermarkets expanded from selling just food items to selling clothing and a wide range of other commodities. They soon realized they needed a way to keep track of everything.
Before barcodes existed, cashiers had to manually enter individual items, which took a long time. Due to the health issues created by these heavily repetitive actions&#;like carpal tunnel syndrome&#;supermarket managers knew they needed to find a solution.
As a result of the growing need to lighten the burden on supermarket cashiers, the point-of-sale (POS) system was born. It allowed items to be scanned individually and then registered by a computer.
But then supermarkets faced another obstacle: Barcodes could only store up to around 20 alphanumeric characters of information and function within one dimension (one coding direction).
DENSO WAVE and their lead developer, Masahiro Hara, invented the QR Code to solve this problem by developing a 2D Code (two coding directions) to hold more information.
They first came up with the idea of the square because their research showed that it was an easily distinguishable shape. This also boosted the speed at which scanners could read information (up to ten times faster than with barcodes).
The combination was a jackpot. DENSO WAVE made the QR Code public in without maintaining patent rights. The use of QR Codes spread like wildfire.
QR Codes were first used in Japan&#;s automotive industry. They quickly recognized these codes&#; versatility and began to use them in production, shipping, and transactions.
Following that came the subsequent societal demand for more product traceability&#;particularly in food and pharmaceuticals. Later on, in , the ISO international standards added QR Codes to their list, allowing them to reach an international level of recognition. Later on, with the invention of the smartphone, there was no stopping the increasing rate of its popularity. Everyone now had their own QR Code scanning mobile devices in their pocket.
Many are familiar with the standard Static QR Codes. However, there are actually many types of barcodes and QR Codes with different capabilities. Here are a few of the most popular versions:
Micro QR Codes
As the name implies, micro QR Codes are small enough to fit on smaller items. They save that space by printing fewer position detection patterns in smaller margins. The tradeoff is that micro QR Codes hold less information than regular-sized ones.
Micro QR Codes in comparison with a normal size QR Code.iQR Codes
On the other end of the spectrum, iQR Codes provide more data than a regular QR Code while remaining the same size. They can also be sized down while retaining the same amount of information.
The rectangle shape of an iQR CodeFrameQR
FrameQR Codes were developed in to allow for more creativity in the QR Code look. QR Code Generator offers a wide range of customization features, including color, shape, type, logo, and much more.
So, how are QR Codes Generated? Before we dive into the mechanics of QR Codes, let&#;s lay the groundwork for understanding how these versatile codes function.
One of the easiest ways to think about QR Codes is that they have their own language that can only be interpreted by scanners.
For example, when a QR Code is made, data like a URL is converted or encoded into the white and black square pattern you see. The different regions of those patterns convey specific information.
The three large squares in the corners orient the scanner. Next, the smaller squares throughout the code, known as positioning markers, help the scanner correct any skewing due to the positioning.
Then, there are even finer details. For instance, timing patterns are lines of alternating black and white squares that map the size of the data regions.
Lastly, the version information determines the size of a QR Code. Since people frequently handle these codes and leave them outside, they can become damaged or dirty. The format defines the amount of the QR Code, separated into four levels, that can be damaged before its readability is affected.
One of the best parts of QR Codes is that you can simply open the camera app on a smartphone and point it at the code until it scans. Today, this feature often comes as a native part of your Android or iPhone&#;s capabilities, so there are no extra apps to download.
However, many apps offer advanced features or are great options if your doesn&#;t scan QR Codes already.
As the code is scanned, your or the app you&#;re using interprets what it reads. Specifically, it focuses on the data region to find the information that it will then decode and present to you.
At the same time, error correction algorithms work within the format to retrieve data from damaged or dirty parts of the code.
Finally, the scanner responds to the information it decoded from the QR Code. If it&#;s a URL, that means asking if you&#;d like to open the corresponding webpage or doing so automatically.
There are a ton of uses for QR Codes. Seriously. We&#;ve got a comprehensive guide with examples, but we&#;ll summarize a few below.
One of the most popular QR Code ideas is for business cards. This could come in handy when you&#;re at a networking event, speaking to a lot of people quickly&#;without much time to exchange physical business cards.
Instead of carrying around a stack of cards for events, you can use digital cards with QR Codes. The vCard Plus QR Code makes uploading business card details directly to your smartphone simple!
An additional advantage is that you aren&#;t limited to the space on a traditional business card. With a digital version, potential clients or partners can view you on social media, get contact information, or even book an appointment with you.
Many people are familiar with codes on supermarket goods, but they have a place on other consumer products as well.
For example, say you have a seasonal product available for Christmas. You can use a PDF QR Code to attach a special recipe directly to that product in a manner that doesn&#;t detract from the packaging design.
Further uses for product packaging could be adding Social Media QR Codes to gain more followers.
One way to ensure medical staff provides the best possible care is by getting customer feedback. QR Codes allow patients to fill out surveys and feedback forms on their own time using Feedback QR Codes. This works well with an online booking system, so you can send these surveys automatically after an appointment.
Say you&#;re planning an event like a surprised birthday party where you need a reliable way for attendees to RSVP. You can simplify this process by sending invitees an Event QR Code with all the details and a way for them to RSVP and add it directly to their calendars.
You&#;re probably used to seeing billboards and other print ads offering discounts for gym subscriptions&#;especially around New Year&#;s. But marketers can make these ads even more effective by adding a Coupon QR Code directly to the graphics. Combine it with a limited offer and a link to your website, and you&#;ve got an easy way to reach new customers with much less work involved.
Restaurants face the constant challenge of printing, maintaining, and updating their paper menus. After all, changes to the menu or a single mistake could call for the entire set to be reprinted.
QR Codes solve that problem by linking to digital menus that are easier to update. Plus, any customer with a smartphone can quickly access it without waiting for one to be brought to them.
Many vendors can benefit from QR Codes. For example, if you&#;re at a farmers market and need to pay for produce through Venmo, the vendor could show you a QR Code that takes you directly to their Venmo account instead of searching for it.
Companies that provide home services like HVAC and plumbing can also present customers with QR Codes as soon as their services are complete, so the payment is processed sooner and with fewer hurdles.
Many people are already using QR Codes in their daily life or as a part of their business since they bring the following benefits to the table:
There&#;s no arguing that QR Codes are the fastest way to connect to a webpage or network or find payment information. All someone needs to do is scan the code, and they can connect without entering a URL or searching for the correct information.
QR codes have dozens of use cases across virtually every industry. They can link to menus, scheduling forms, healthcare forms, and anything else hosted online.
QR Codes are easy to make and post and offer a reliable way for customers and potential customers to connect to your business. They&#;re also a cost-effective way to advertise your services&#;especially when compared to traditional print ads.
QR Codes&#; small size also makes them easy to place in many different locations. For example, think of the size of your average dinner menu compared to a QR Code. They also easily fit on most product packaging.
Are you ready to see how QR Codes can make connecting to your business more efficient?
QR Code Generator makes it simple to create, manage, and track your QR Codes in one place so you can use them to their full potential.
Sign up for QR Code Generator now to see how they can connect your business to a new world of possibilities.
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