Symbologies

QRGen identifies barcode types with the same lowercase ids on every platform. Use them in symbologies options, in generate({ symbology }), and to read barcode.symbology in results.

Matching rules

Inputs are matched case-insensitively after removing everything except letters and digits, so QRCode, qr-code, QR and qr all resolve to qr. Display names (EAN-13, Data Matrix) and the aliases below work too. Unknown names are ignored.

Where a list is expected, you can pass an array or a string separated by commas, spaces, semicolons or pipes, and mix ids with groups:

import { resolveSymbologies, toSymbology } from "qrgen-sdk";

resolveSymbologies("retail, qr");  // ["ean13", "ean8", "upca", "upce", "isbn", "databar", "databar-expanded", "databar-limited", "qr"]
toSymbology("GS1-128");            // "code128"
toSymbology("Interleaved 2 of 5"); // "itf"

All symbologies

id	Name	Type	Aliases	Read	Write	Apple Vision	ML Kit
qr	QR Code	2D	qrcode	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
micro-qr	Micro QR Code	2D	microqrcode	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
rmqr	rMQR Code	2D	rmqrcode	Yes	Yes	No	No
data-matrix	Data Matrix	2D	datamatrix, dm	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
aztec	Aztec	2D	azteccode, aztecrune	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
pdf417	PDF417	2D	compactpdf417, pdf	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
micro-pdf417	MicroPDF417	2D	micropdf417, micropdf	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
maxicode	MaxiCode	2D		Yes	Yes	No	No
ean13	EAN-13	Linear	ean, jan, gtin13	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
ean8	EAN-8	Linear	gtin8	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
upca	UPC-A	Linear	upc, gtin12	Yes	Yes	Yes (as EAN-13 with a leading 0)	Yes
upce	UPC-E	Linear		Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
isbn	ISBN	Linear	isbn13, bookland	Yes	Yes	Yes (as EAN-13 with a 978/979 prefix)	Yes (as EAN-13)
code128	Code 128	Linear	gs1128, ean128, ucc128	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
code39	Code 39	Linear	code3of9, code39std, code39ext, code39extended	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
code93	Code 93	Linear		Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
codabar	Codabar	Linear	nw7, code2of7	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
itf	Interleaved 2 of 5	Linear	interleaved2of5, i2of5, i25	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
itf14	ITF-14	Linear	gtin14	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes (as ITF)
databar	GS1 DataBar	Linear	rss14, databaromni, gs1databar, rss	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
databar-expanded	GS1 DataBar Expanded	Linear	rssexpanded, databarexp, gs1databarexpanded	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
databar-limited	GS1 DataBar Limited	Linear	rsslimited, databarltd, gs1databarlimited	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
code32	Code 32 (Italian Pharmacode)	Linear	italianpharmacode, pharmacode32	Yes	Yes	No	No
pzn	PZN (Pharmazentralnummer)	Linear	pharmazentralnummer	Yes	Yes	No	No
telepen	Telepen	Linear	telepenalpha, telepennumeric	Yes	Yes	No	No
dx-film-edge	DX Film Edge	Linear	dxfilmedge	Yes	Yes	No	No

Read and Write refer to the JavaScript SDK (web and Node.js), which reads and writes all 26. The Apple Vision and ML Kit columns show which ids the native iOS and Android scanners can read; see platform support.

In results, symbologyName holds the display name and symbologyIdentifier the AIM identifier when the engine reports one (for example ]Q1 for QR, ]C1 for GS1-128, ]E0 for EAN-13).

Groups

Group	Expands to
all (also any, everything)	Every symbology. The default when none is given.
linear or 1d	ean13 ean8 upca upce isbn code128 code39 code93 codabar itf itf14 databar databar-expanded databar-limited code32 pzn telepen dx-film-edge
matrix or 2d	qr micro-qr rmqr data-matrix aztec pdf417 micro-pdf417 maxicode
retail	ean13 ean8 upca upce isbn databar databar-expanded databar-limited
industrial	code128 code39 code93 codabar itf itf14 data-matrix
gs1	code128 data-matrix qr databar databar-expanded databar-limited

Groups work wherever a list of symbologies is accepted (scanner options, scanImage, the element’s symbologies attribute, the CLI’s --symbologies, the REST API). They are not accepted by generate(), which needs exactly one symbology.

SYMBOLOGY_GROUPS exports this table, and resolveSymbologies() expands groups in code.

Related symbologies

Some symbologies are subsets of others:

• A UPC-A is an EAN-13 whose first digit is 0. An ISBN barcode is an EAN-13 that starts with 978 or 979. ITF-14 is a 14-digit Interleaved 2 of 5.
• UPC-A codes are reported as upca with 12 digits whenever upca is enabled. If you enable ean13 without upca, they are reported as ean13 with 13 digits (0036000291452).
• ISBN and ITF-14 codes are reported with the parent id (ean13, itf) when the parent is enabled too, which includes the default all and the retail and industrial groups. Enable isbn without ean13, or itf14 without itf, to get the specific id.
• Whatever id you get, parseContent(data, { symbology }) returns the same 14-digit gtin, so use that for product lookups. For books, parseContent reports kind: "isbn" for 13-digit data starting with 978 or 979.

Platform support

Platform	Engine	Reads	Writes
Web (qrgen-sdk)	zxing-cpp (WebAssembly)	All 26	All 26
Node.js (qrgen-sdk/node), CLI, REST API	zxing-cpp (WebAssembly)	All 26	All 26
Python (qrgen-sdk on PyPI)	zxing-cpp	All 26	All 26
iOS and macOS (QRGenKit)	Apple Vision	The subset in the Apple Vision column	qr, pdf417, aztec, code128; others through the REST API
Android (dev.qrgen:qrgen-android)	Google ML Kit	The subset in the ML Kit column	See the Android guide
WebView platforms (embed page)	zxing-cpp (WebAssembly)	All 26	Not applicable (scanning only)

React Native, Flutter and .NET depend on the back end they use; see the React Native, Flutter and .NET guides. Platforms skip ids they can’t read, without an error, and report what they support at runtime:

import QRGen from "qrgen-sdk";

QRGen.supportedSymbologies(); // { read: [...26 ids], write: [...26 ids] }

The CLI prints the same table with qrgen symbologies, and the REST API returns it from GET /v1/symbologies.

Choosing symbologies

Enabling fewer symbologies makes scanning faster and reduces false reads. Recommended sets for common use cases are in Barcode scanning.