How-to: How To Scan QR Codes With Your Motorola Droid Smartphone

Have you ever seen those strange codes that look like a jumble of small squares? They look to be in no special order, but to Android smartphones, they are a coded language. Knowing how to scan these codes, called QR ( Quick Response ) codes can save you money, get repeat customers, impress your geeky friends and a lot more. Read along as we find out how to scan a QR code with your Motorola Droid Android device.

One of the first things to have to scan those gnarly looking codes is a newer Android smartphone. The better QR code apps are going to be made for later versions of Android. That means if you have an earlier Motorola Droid with an older Android version inside you may want to think of upgrading. There are newer models out now that have Android 2.3 inside. The Droid 3 has this. Getting a newer smartphone means the user can take advantage of advanced programming that has been building up over the years, plus extra speed. Scanning QR codes with a slow smartphone is not a great experience. Make sure the smartphone has a decent camera. The camera is the actual tool used to scan the QR code.

The next step with this process is to download a good rated QR code scanner to your Droid smartphone. One with some good feedback and a boring name is the "Barcode Scanner" app. This is a free app that is connected with Google features. If you are scanning a book it can find certain words in the book as long as it is listed at Google. Otherwise, the user can look up prices and reviews on whatever it is that gets scanned. The QR codes can contain URLs ( domain names ) calendar events, contact information and more. Contacts can be shared with the app and it can even translate words into Chinese. That is a long list of features for being a free Android app.

The "Barcode Scanner" app is not the only QR code scanner app for Android. There are plenty of others. Another such app is the free "Quickmark Lite". This program is not as robust as the above app but also does not access personal information such as contacts. Other apps like the iXMat barcode scanner and Redlaser are all available for the downloading online, depending on the wants of the smartphone user.

After downloading the correct QR code scanner to your Droid, the hard work is done. Simply point the camera at the QR code and let the app do its work. This may take some practice, but not much. For example, if a CD you like is for sale and has a QR code on it, point the smartphone camera at the code making sure to center the camera over the three largest squares inside the code. Those are the ones in the top right, left and bottom left. Do not worry if the code is upside down, though. The app will know how to read it as long as those three large squares are in view. Listen for the beep or the visual confirmation that the code was successfully scanned. Then, read your new information on the screen. It is as simple as that. Be careful what you scan as some QR codes end up taking you to malware-infected web sites.

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