Bitly vs Ok1Second for QR codes

Bitly began as a link shortener and grew into a connections platform: short links, landing pages, a link-in-bio page and a QR code generator, all managed from one dashboard. Its QR codes are one output of that platform, and the pricing is built around the platform — links, pages and seats — rather than around codes.

Ok1Second does one thing: the QR code and the redirect service that keeps it working. There is no link shortener to manage and no landing-page builder, which is why the price has no relationship to how many links you shorten.

That difference decides the choice more than any single number. If QR codes are one part of a broader link strategy, a platform is the natural home for them. If the codes are the whole job — menus, packaging, signage, labels — a platform is a lot of machinery for one feature.

Both services have a free tier, but they are metered differently. Bitly's free plan gives you two QR codes per month and five short links per month, and it is ad-supported. Ok1Second's free plan gives you three dynamic QR codes, with unlimited scans, no ads, and no monthly reset — the three codes are yours to keep.

Neither free plan caps scanning. That is the point people usually miss: on both services, a code you have printed keeps resolving to the destination no matter how many times it is scanned. What the free tiers limit is how many new codes you can create, and on Bitly that allowance refills monthly rather than belonging to you.

A printed campaign rarely needs one code. A single restaurant might want a code per table plus one for the window; a packaging run might carry forty variants. The number that matters is how many codes you can create, and how often that allowance resets.

Bitly meters code creation on every plan: two per month free, five on Core, ten on Growth, two hundred on Premium. If a print run needs fifty codes in a single month, Core's five per month is a hard stop, and the plan that clears it is Premium at $199/month.

Ok1Second caps the free plan at three dynamic codes and then removes the cap on Pro. There is no per-month allowance to plan around: the codes you create in one month are counted the same as the codes you create next month.

Bitly's Core plan is $10/month, or $120/year, for five QR codes a month and a hundred links, with thirty days of scan data. Growth is $29/month ($348/year) and adds a custom domain and bulk creation. Premium is $199/month ($2,388/year) and adds two hundred codes a month, a year of data and city-level analytics.

Ok1Second's Pro plan is $4/month, or $20/year, with unlimited dynamic codes, unlimited scans, a custom short domain and conditional routing. That is under half of Bitly's entry price, and around a hundredth of its top plan when both are compared by the year — but it buys a QR-code service, not a link platform, and the comparison is only fair once you have decided which of those you need.

If you already pay for a link shortener, the relevant comparison is the QR add-on, not the whole plan. If you would be buying Bitly purely for its QR codes, you are paying for a platform to use one corner of it.

A dynamic QR code points at a short link that a service resolves. If that short link sits on the service's own domain, the printed code depends on that service staying online and on your plan staying active.

Both services let you put the redirect on a custom domain: Bitly includes a complimentary custom domain on Growth and above, and Ok1Second includes a custom short domain on Pro. Running the redirect on a domain you control is the single most effective way to keep a printed code working, because it means a future move to another provider is a DNS change rather than a reprint.

Bitly's analytics are its strongest suit and the clearest reason to pick it: thirty days of click and scan data on Core, four months on Growth, a full year on Premium, with city-level and device-type breakdowns at the top tier and mobile deep linking to route app links correctly.

Ok1Second reports scans per code — count, country and device type — and keeps the history for as long as the code is active, rather than expiring it on a plan schedule. That is enough to answer whether a placement earned its ink; it is not the campaign-level attribution product Bitly sells. If you are optimizing a large multi-channel campaign, Bitly's data is the more capable tool.

The cleanest way to decide is to name what you are actually buying. If you need short links, landing pages and deep linking alongside QR codes, Bitly is the broader product and the platform price is buying features you will use. If you need codes that live in print and keep resolving, the platform is overhead, and the flat, low price and uncapped codes of a dedicated service are the better fit.