How We Count Scans: Counting Rules & Accuracy

What Counts as a Scan?

Every dynamic QR code scan represents an authentic, real-time HTTP redirect initiated by a genuine visitor. When someone scans your QR code with their camera or QR scanner app, their device requests our edge redirect server. If the request is verified as authentic, we increment your scan count and record device, operating system, and geographic information in milliseconds before forwarding the user to your destination URL.

What Is Excluded from Your Scan Counts?

To ensure your marketing data is 100% trustworthy and free of artificial inflation, our redirect edge automatically detects and filters out non-human traffic:

• Search Engine & Crawler Bots: Automated crawlers (including Googlebot, Bingbot, Yandex, Applebot, Baidu, SEO audit bots, and AI scrapers) are served the redirect but are strictly excluded from your analytics.
• Link Preview Prefetchers: When a QR destination is pasted into messaging apps (like Slack, iMessage, WhatsApp, or Telegram) or pre-rendered by mobile browsers, servers issue speculative prefetch requests with headers such as purpose: prefetch or sec-purpose: preview. We fulfill the redirect header but do not count it as a scan.
• HTTP HEAD Requests: Uptime monitors or link-checking scripts sending HEAD verification pings are served HTTP 302 headers without recording scan events.

Why Does Our Scan Count Differ from Google Analytics 4 (GA4)?

It is common to see a difference between Link Code Generator scan counts and page views in Google Analytics 4. In nearly all cases, Link Code Generator records a higher, more accurate count of physical scans than GA4 reports in page views. Here is why:

1. Ad Blockers & Privacy Extensions: Many mobile browsers and extensions (such as Brave, Safari Advanced Tracking Protection, or uBlock Origin) block client-side JavaScript trackers like Google Analytics (gtag.js). Our edge redirect happens at the network layer and cannot be blocked by browser extensions.
2. Cookie & Consent Banners: Visitors who decline or ignore GDPR/CCPA cookie consent banners on your landing page are never tracked in GA4, even though they scanned your QR code and visited your site.
3. JavaScript Execution & Slow Connections: If a visitor scans a code on poor mobile data and closes the tab before the full webpage and third-party tracking scripts finish loading, the visit is lost in GA4 but logged at our redirect layer.
4. UTM Tracking: To view QR traffic inside Google Analytics, add UTM parameters to your destination URL (e.g. utm_source=qr&utm_medium=print).

Timezones and Retention

All scans are recorded with UTC timestamps at our edge and automatically converted to your local browser timezone when viewed in your dashboard. Detailed scan events are retained according to your plan (unlimited lifetime retention for Pro plans, 30 days for Free plans). Historical scan totals are preserved permanently.