11 iPhone QR Code Readers Tested

I'm a fan of 2D barcodes and of course I wanted to have a decoder for them on my iPhone. The appstore has a nice selection of tools available. But which to use? I downloaded all free ones I could find (and one payed one) and tried to test them.

To be honest, these tools have a really hard job because the camera on the iPhone sucks (unless you own the brand new 3GS model). For testing the recognition skills I let them decode two codes in three different sizes. I used one very simple code and one very complex one (the more data is encoded the more complex the code gets). I gave one point for each code that was easily recognized by the tool. So there were 6 points to reach. If I managed to get a code recognized after several careful tries, I assigned 0.5 points. None of the tools was able to recognize the blurry mess the iPhone cam made from the small versions of the codes, so the highest score reached was 4.

All tested tools understood at least QR Code, some recognized additional 2D barcodes like DataMatrix.

But it's not only important to recognize and decode the code. It is also important to interpret the data correctly and let me easily use it. URLs should open in Safari, E-Mail addresses should open the email application, and phone numbers should be callable. Ideally the App should also understand vcards embedded in the code. For phone numbers some applications needed the number to be prefixed with TEL: while others did not like that prefix at all :-/ .

Well, here are the results in a shiny table:

	Recog	Tel	Codes
2D Sense	3	¹⁾	6
Snappr 2D	4		1
UpCode	4		2
NeoReader	4	²⁾	2
Barcodes	4	³⁾	1
Barcode	4	⁴⁾	2
Camclic	4	⁵⁾	1
BeeTagg	3.5		3
dood me co	4		1
QuickMark lite	3.5		2
QuickMark	4 auto	⁶⁾	3

My favorite is “Quickmark” (prized at $2) because the ability to add new contacts to my address book by using vcards is the killer feature for me. The missing telephone number support looks more like a bug than a missing feature to me, so I'm hopeful this gets fixed soon. And the automatic scanning (no need to take a photo - just point the camera in the right direction) makes scanning much easier.

What's your experience? What application works best for you? Did I miss one? Let me know in the comments please.

Tags:: 2dbarcode,; semacode,; qrcode,; datamatrix,; iphone,; apps,; comparison

Similar posts:

¹⁾ without TEL:

²⁾ , ³⁾ , ⁵⁾ with TEL:

⁴⁾ “call number” opens email

⁶⁾ recognized with TEL: but not callable

Posted on Friday, July the 10th 2009 (8 months ago).

Well, I do not own an Iphone, but there is a nice tool for nokia mobiles too with all the features:
http://mobilecodes.nokia.com/scan.htm

2009-07-10 06:31:44

Hannes

Thanks... I gave 2d splash 3 chances to get it right, and it failed each time. So I tried quickmark light, and it got the same code 2d splash failed at on the first try. So I bought regular quickmark and the instant decode worked beautifully. So anyway, thanks for posting this info.

2009-07-29 02:39:06

Will

Thanks for doing all the research. I bought Quickmark and as I was raising my phone up to my screen it decoded the QRCode. Wow!

2009-08-14 01:56:28

Rob

Since QuickMark is a paid app, it must have some support. I'm wrinting to them to get this bug fixed.

Thanks for the post Andreas!

2009-10-18 03:13:47

Cleiton

Try "I-Nigma"

2009-11-16 21:52:33

Philoyche

Hallo, I use quickmark on my iPhone but I cannot read any V-card created with automated tools around The web! Why is that? Quickmark always thinks it is trading a text content! Can u suggest me an automated app able of creating V-cards compatible with qmark?

2009-12-12 15:02:21

TheDarkmaster

@TheDarmkmaster

Try it on http://goqr.me/ Works for me.

2010-02-14 01:14:17

Hans

Hello,

Thanks.

Helder

2010-02-20 11:04:11

Helder

Downloaded QuickMark, installed, works fine.
Cannot figure out how to import the vCards that QuickMark had scanned into the iPhone Address Book.
Any one?

2010-03-03 01:22:48

John