One QR Code for Your App on iPhone and Android

The poster has two codes on it, one under the Apple badge and one under Google Play. Some people pick the wrong one, land in a store their phone cannot use, and walk on.

You can print one code instead. It opens a small page with a button for each store, and the reader taps the one that matches their phone.

Why two codes lose people

Two codes side by side ask the reader to make a decision before they have done anything. They also halve the size each code can be, and a smaller code is a harder scan from across a room.

One code with “Scan to download” beside it asks for nothing except the scan.

A store redirect or a page with both buttons

There are two ways to make one code work for both phones, and it is worth knowing which one you are getting.

• A redirect. Some generators read which phone is scanning and jump straight to the matching store. It saves a tap, but a laptop or a phone without Google Play lands somewhere useless, and the reader sees nothing about your app first.
• A page with both buttons. The code opens a short page about your app, with a button for each store. It is one tap slower, and it works on any device, because the reader chooses.

Ours is the second kind. In the app QR code generator you add your App Store and Google Play links, and the page shows a button for each one you fill in.

What the page can show

A bare pair of buttons works. A page that says what the app is gets more taps, because the reader knows what they are about to install.

• The basics: the app's name, the developer, a category and a price label.
• Up to eight screenshots, in a strip the reader can swipe.
• Up to six features, plus a short description and a note on what is new.
• A third button, with your own label, for another store or a direct download.

Changing it after it is printed

The code points at the page, not at the stores. A new listing, a renamed app or a link you got wrong is an edit, and the printed code stays exactly as it is.

Because every scan goes through that page, scans are counted too, leaving out visits from you and your team while you check it. That is the difference between a static code and a dynamic one.

If that distinction is new, it takes two minutes and saves a reprint: dynamic versus static QR codes.

When one store is all you need

If your app is only on the App Store, you do not need a page at all. Apple's own App Store marketing tools will make a code for your listing, and it does the job for iPhone users.

The page earns its place when there are two stores, when you want to say something before the store loads, or when the links might change.

Before you print

• Scan it with both phones. One iPhone, one Android, each tapping its own button, on mobile data rather than the office Wi-Fi.
• Open it on a laptop too. Codes end up in slide decks and emails, and both stores open their web listings in a browser.
• Put the store badges beside it. They tell the reader at a glance that the code is for an app, before they scan anything.
• Print it big enough. Roughly a tenth of the distance it will be read from: two or three centimetres on a card, much more on a stand.

If a test scan fails, the cause is nearly always on this list: nine reasons a QR code will not scan.

One code, a line saying what it does, and a test on both phones. That covers almost every app poster that works.