The technical mechanics, briefly.
Dynamic QR codes seem magical at first — same printed image, different destinations over time. But the way they actually work is straightforward once you see it. Understanding the mechanics helps you make smart decisions about when to use them and what their failure modes are.
A dynamic QR encodes a permanent short URL (like qrth.is/r/abc) into the image, instead of your final destination. When someone scans, their phone follows that short URL — which hits our redirect server, which looks up the current destination in a database, which responds with an HTTP 302 redirect to that destination. The phone then loads the destination URL. All in under 200ms.
Last updated: August 2026