Sign in Subscribe
ai

QRX: Merging Art and Technology in QR Codes

JM del Pino

• 4 min read
QRX: Merging Art and Technology in QR Codes

In today’s digital landscape, QR codes are ubiquitous and their usage continues to grow exponentially. According to recent data, the global QR code market is expected to reach $21.14 billion by 2027, growing at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 15.2% from 2020 to 2027. QR codes are leveraged in a variety of use cases, from marketing campaigns and product packaging to event management and contactless payments.

However, traditional QR codes are designed for computers — boring, black-and-white squares that limit brand expression and creative flexibility. Enter our latest venture QRX, a revolutionary solution that uses AI to transform simple text into beautiful, fully functional QR codes. Just enter a description and a URL, and QRX generates a QR code artistically embedded into an image that reflects your description.

QRX codes are perfect for brands aiming to capture consumer attention and deliver engaging promotional campaigns. QRX is accessible to everyone for free, with a premium version available for USD $20/month that allows users to create an unlimited number of codes, generate higher quality codes, and modify the URL they redirect to, among other features. The response has been overwhelming, with over 600,000 codes created by users to date.

How it all started

Let’s rewind to the origin story of QRX. At MakerX, we create ventures through three sources of inspiration: Market-led ventures, where we identify an unmet need in the market; Asset-led ventures, where we partner with a corporate that has a strategic asset that could give a venture an unfair advantage; and Research & Development (R&D)-led ventures, where we explore innovative technologies and search for novel use cases. QRX is an R&D-led venture.

We have always been interested in the Generative AI space and started casual conversations about potential applications of Stable Diffusion. One idea that surfaced was creating visually appealing QR codes. Initially, it was just another idea among many, but then Matt, our CEO, while recovering from a flu at home 🙄, couldn’t resist the urge to prototype QRX. He developed the first version in a day and showed it to Brent, our Head of Ventures. Recognizing the potential, they decided to put serious effort into it. In less than a month, a consumer version of QRX was live, and users showed immediate interest, making it into the top 10 list of new AI tools on Thereasnaiforthat, a prominent aggregator of AI tools, within a month.

Enterprise Opportunity

While QRX is fantastic for consumers and small businesses, we see immense potential for large enterprises such as advertising agencies, Fast-Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) companies, and consumer brands. These organisations have distinct requirements, so we decided to validate our concept before scaling it for enterprise use. We conducted a test: newspaper ads for a generic brand in The Sydney Morning Herald over three consecutive Tuesdays. We used three different QR codes: a colour QRX code, a black-and-white QRX code, and a traditional QR code. The results were striking: the colour QRX code drove 5 times more traffic than the traditional QR code, and the black-and-white QRX code did 3 times better. QRX codes significantly increase engagement, confirming that we’re onto something big.


To make QRX enterprise-ready, we built a highly scalable architecture, a robust API, enterprise-grade security and privacy features, and SLA support and maintenance. Leveraging MakerX’s experience in developing business-critical products for enterprise environments, we also developed a patent-pending QR code scannability engine. This engine ensures optimal scannability by automatically optimising the AI behind the scenes and performing hardware scan verification across various modern mobile devices. Additionally, we created functionality to generate thousands of similar-looking codes, each with a unique URL. This enables use cases such as a cereal company printing codes on packaging for a promotion where some codes lead to a prize-winning page.

What’s Ahead

Today, we are excited to announce the launch of our premium generator engine for paid subscribers. This engine generates ideal codes more consistently — codes that closely resemble the prompt, scan on all devices, and are aesthetically pleasing.


Our roadmap includes building features for our community of passionate creators to showcase their codes and discover cool ones, ultimately leading to a QRX code marketplace where people can buy and sell codes.

We’re excited about QRX’s future. If you are excited too:

Sign up for more like this.

Enter your email
Subscribe