Barcode Types Compared

Which barcode does what, how much it holds and where it's used.

A barcode symbology is a set of rules for turning characters into bars and spaces (1D, or linear, barcodes) or into a pattern of square cells (2D codes). Linear barcodes are read along one line, so they hold a few dozen characters at most; stacked and matrix 2D codes are read as an image and hold hundreds or thousands. Every symbology here is defined by an ISO/IEC or industry standard that scanners follow.

The right choice depends less on the data than on who will scan it. Shop tills expect UPC-A or EAN-13 carrying a GS1 product number; warehouses expect ITF-14 and GS1-128; your own systems can use whatever their scanners read, which usually means Code 128 for labels and Data Matrix or QR for 2D. The second table below starts from the job instead of the symbology.

Every barcode type at a glance

Symbology	Kind	Characters	Capacity	Typical use	Standard
UPC-A	1D	Digits	12 digits (11 + check digit)	Retail products in the US and Canada	ISO/IEC 15420, GS1
UPC-E	1D	Digits	8 digits (a zero-suppressed UPC-A)	Small retail packs in the US and Canada	ISO/IEC 15420, GS1
EAN-13	1D	Digits	13 digits (12 + check digit)	Retail products worldwide	ISO/IEC 15420, GS1
EAN-8	1D	Digits	8 digits (7 + check digit)	Very small retail packs	ISO/IEC 15420, GS1
ISBN (Bookland EAN)	1D	Digits	13 digits, optional 5-digit price add-on	Books, starting 978 or 979	ISO 2108, GS1
Code 128	1D	All 128 ASCII characters	Variable; digits pack two per character	Shipping, inventory, assets, documents	ISO/IEC 15417
GS1-128	1D	Digits and the GS1 set of 82 characters	Up to 48 data characters, 165 mm wide	Case and pallet labels with Application Identifiers	ISO/IEC 15417, GS1
Code 39	1D	0-9, A-Z, space and - . $ / + %	Variable; wider than Code 128 for the same data	ID badges, defense and automotive parts	ISO/IEC 16388
Code 93	1D	All 128 ASCII characters	Variable; denser than Code 39	Logistics and postal labels (Canada Post)	ANSI/AIM BC5
ITF-14	1D	Digits	14 digits (a GTIN-14)	Outer cases and shipping cartons	ISO/IEC 16390, GS1
Interleaved 2 of 5	1D	Digits (an even number)	Variable	Warehouses, cartons, industrial labels	ISO/IEC 16390
Codabar	1D	0-9 and - $ : / . + with A-D start/stop	Variable	Libraries, blood banks, labs	ANSI/AIM BC3
MSI Plessey	1D	Digits	Variable	Shelf edge labels, warehouse bins	No ISO standard (MSI Data Corporation)
PDF417	Stacked 2D	Text, digits and bytes	1,850 text characters, 2,710 digits or 1,108 bytes	Driver's licences, boarding passes, documents	ISO/IEC 15438
Data Matrix (ECC 200)	2D	Text, digits and bytes	3,116 digits, 2,335 text characters or 1,556 bytes	Parts marking, electronics, healthcare (GS1 DataMatrix)	ISO/IEC 16022
Aztec	2D	Text, digits and bytes	3,832 digits, 3,067 letters or 1,914 bytes	Train tickets, mobile boarding passes	ISO/IEC 24778
QR Code	2D	Text, digits, bytes and kanji	7,089 digits, 4,296 characters or 2,953 bytes	Links, payments and menus scanned by phones	ISO/IEC 18004

Which barcode should I use?

You need a barcode for	Use	Why
A product sold in shops in the US or Canada	UPC-A	Every point-of-sale scanner reads it; the number comes from GS1 US or GS1 Canada.
A product sold in shops anywhere else	EAN-13	The worldwide retail standard; US scanners have read it since 2005.
A very small retail pack	EAN-8 or UPC-E	Shorter symbols for packs where a full-size code won't fit.
A book	ISBN (EAN-13)	Book trade systems read the ISBN-13 from the Bookland EAN.
A shipping carton of a retail product	ITF-14	Prints well on corrugated board and carries the case GTIN-14.
A pallet or parcel label with batch, dates or an SSCC	GS1-128	Application Identifiers say what each field means.
Stock, asset, bin or document labels	Code 128	Compact, encodes letters and digits, read by every scanner.
A system that already uses an older code	Code 39, Codabar or MSI	Match what the existing scanners and software expect.
Lots of data on an ID card or document	PDF417	Holds over a thousand characters and reads with linear imagers.
A tiny label on a part or medical product	Data Matrix	The most compact 2D code for short data, and readable when damaged.
A ticket shown on a phone screen	Aztec	Needs no quiet zone and reads well from screens.

Good to know

1D or 2D?

Laser scanners at older tills and in warehouses read only 1D barcodes. Camera-based imagers, including phones, read both. If the people or systems scanning your code might use a laser scanner, choose a 1D barcode or check first.

Capacities are maximums

The 2D capacities are for the largest symbol at the lowest error correction. Real codes hold less, because they use more error correction and stay a sensible size; a 2D code with a few hundred characters is already large.