Graklink vs Hovercode

Does Hovercode’s free plan really never expire?

For the first three codes, yes, and they mean it. Hovercode’s pricing page says so directly: “Your first 3 QR codes will never expire, regardless of when you create them.” No ads, no credit card, unlimited scans. The promise holds exactly as long as you stay at three codes. Code number four needs an active Hovercode Pro subscription to exist, and Hovercode’s own FAQ says those extra codes “will expire if your subscription is cancelled.” Graklink runs the other way: every code you buy, first or fortieth, is a one-time $7.99, and none of them need a subscription to keep working.

Buy a code with nothing to cancel at graklink.com.

Credit where it’s due: the free plan is honest

Worth saying plainly: Hovercode is one of the few QR tools whose homepage claim survives contact with its own fine print. Three dynamic codes, unlimited scans, real editing after print, no time bomb hidden in the terms. If a menu, a flyer, and a door sign covers your whole operation, Hovercode’s free plan is a genuinely good, genuinely free answer. Use it.

Hovercode’s “never expires” carries one asterisk: first three only. Graklink’s doesn’t carry any.

The catch: code four needs a live subscription

Most businesses outgrow three printed codes fast. A menu, a hiring flyer, a loyalty sign-up, a review prompt, a seasonal poster: that’s five before lunch. Hovercode’s free plan caps dynamic codes at three total, so making a fourth requires Pro at $12 a month ($120 a year paid annually). Per their own FAQ, cancelling that subscription does not just stop new codes. Any code past the first three “will become inactive but won’t be deleted,” and any code running on a custom domain “will stop working.” Hovercode turns everything back on if you resubscribe, which is fairer than most of the category, but the code stapled to your menu only works while the subscription does.

Skip the subscription and own the code instead.

What it costs past code three

	Hovercode	Graklink
Free tier	3 dynamic codes total, unlimited scans, never expire	Static code, unlimited scans, no account
4th code and beyond	Requires Pro, $12/mo ($120/yr paid annually)	$7.99 each, or $4.99 each in a 10-24 bulk order
Cancel the subscription	Codes past the first three go inactive; custom-domain codes stop working	Not applicable, nothing to cancel
10 codes, total cost	Pro subscription, ongoing: $120 to $144/yr	About $49.90, one time
Code stops if you miss a renewal	Yes, for every code past the first three	No, never

Three free codes is a real number. Ten codes on Hovercode is a subscription with a cancel button that quietly turns most of them off.

Graklink’s answer: every code, owned, not rented

• Free static code: unlimited scans, forever, no account. Matches Hovercode’s free tier if your destination never changes.
• Dynamic code, $7.99 once: no cap on how many you buy, and no subscription keeps any of them alive. Bulk pricing: $5.99 each for 2 to 9, $4.99 each for 10 to 24, $3.99 each for 25 or more.
• Optional Pro analytics ($9.99/month or $99/year, unlimited codes) adds deeper tracking, and, like everything else here, never decides whether the code still works.

Not sure you need dynamic at all yet? Start here: static vs dynamic QR codes.

Buy your fourth code, and your fortieth, without opening a subscription.

The math past code three

Keep ten codes alive on Hovercode Pro and you’re paying $120 to $144 a year, every year, for as long as any of them need to work: $360 to $432 over three years, more the longer you run it. Ten Graklink codes cost about $49.90, total, once. One of those numbers stops. The other doesn’t.

When Hovercode’s free plan is the right call

If three dynamic codes really is the ceiling, stop reading and go use Hovercode’s free plan. It costs nothing and it isn’t a trap. The moment a fourth code shows up is the actual decision point: rent it every month, or buy it once and be done.

Weighing QRCodeKIT’s free tier too? It’s the same shape of trade, a scan cap instead of a code cap: see how that one breaks down.

Three free codes is real. Everything past that, you can just own.