How to expire a QR code in Linkbreakers

Short answer

Every QR code and link can carry an optional expiration date. Set one and the QR code stops working at that moment. Visitors are sent to a destination you choose, or shown an expired page if you did not pick one.

Expiration is off by default. A QR code with no expiration date keeps working forever, which is the right answer for most of them.

Quick summary

• Expiration is optional and off by default
• Set it when creating a QR code, or across a whole batch in bulk insert
• Pick where visitors go afterwards, or let them see an expired page
• The date must be in the future
• When it expires, the QR code and its analytics are deleted and the shortlink becomes available again
• The AI assistant can set and remove expirations for you

When you would want this

Expiration is worth using when a QR code is tied to something that genuinely ends:

• A promotion or discount that should stop being redeemable the moment it closes
• Event materials, badges, and signage that should not keep sending people to last year's schedule
• A time-limited download, an internal document, or a link shared for a fixed window
• Printed materials that will outlive the campaign on them, where a dead link is better than a wrong one

If you only want a QR code to change where it points rather than stop working, you do not want expiration. Edit its destination, or use a scheduler condition to route by date. The QR code itself stays alive in both cases.

Setting an expiration date

On a new QR code

In the creation wizard, on the Customize step, find the Expiration section under Organize and click Set an expiration date.

Pick the day, and adjust the time if the exact hour matters. New dates default to 23:59 on the day you pick, because "expires on the 31st" almost always means through the end of the 31st rather than the moment it begins. The time shown is your own local time, so what you see is when it will expire for you.

Optionally fill in Send visitors to. This is where anyone who scans the QR code after it expires ends up. Leave it empty and they get an expired page instead.

Across a whole batch

In bulk insert, click Add expiration above the table. That reveals an expiration column, plus a bar at the top that applies one date to every row at once, which is usually what you want when the whole batch belongs to one campaign. You can still adjust individual rows afterwards.

If you are importing a CSV, the last two columns are the expiration date and the expired destination. Leave them blank for QR codes that never expire.

With the AI assistant

Ask for it in plain language: "make this QR code stop working after the 15th of September and send people to our homepage afterwards".

The assistant never adds an expiration date on its own initiative. It only sets one when you ask for it, and it will tell you what expiring does before it commits.

What visitors see

Once the date passes, anyone scanning the QR code gets one of two things:

• The destination you chose, if you set one. This is the better option for printed material still in circulation, because it puts your visitor somewhere useful instead of at a dead end.
• An expired page, if you did not. It says the link has expired and nothing more.

Either way the original destination is unreachable. There is no window where the QR code half works.

What happens to the QR code itself

This is the part worth reading twice.

Expiring is not archiving. When the date passes, the QR code is removed from your workspace, and everything belonging to it goes too:

• Its scan history and analytics
• Its workflow, including every step you built
• Its tags and its per-link dashboard
• Its QR code image

Its shortlink also becomes available again, so a new QR code can use it later.

This is deliberate. An expired QR code is finished, not paused. If you want the campaign's numbers, export or read them before the expiration date passes.

Changing your mind

You can change or remove an expiration date at any point before it passes. Ask the assistant to remove it, or update the QR code through the API. The QR code carries on as if the date had never been set.

Once the date has passed, the QR code is gone and cannot be brought back. That is why expiration dates must be in the future when you set them: a date in the past would delete a QR code through what looks like an ordinary edit, so Linkbreakers rejects it.

Frequently asked questions

Does an expired QR code keep counting scans?

No. Scans after the expiration date are not tracked, and the scans it collected before then are removed with the QR code.

Can I reuse the shortlink afterwards?

Yes. Once a QR code expires its shortlink goes back into circulation and a new QR code can claim it. Be careful with this if the old QR code is printed on something still in the wild: whoever scans that printed code will reach whatever now sits on that shortlink.

What is the difference between expiring and deleting?

The outcome is the same, the timing is not. Deleting happens when you click delete. Expiring happens on its own at a moment you chose in advance, and lets you leave visitors a destination instead of nothing.

Can I set a QR code to expire after a number of scans?

Not today. Expiration is by date and time only. If scan-based expiry is something you need, tell us.

Does an expired QR code still count towards my plan limits?

No. It no longer exists in your workspace, so it does not count against your QR code allowance. The credits spent creating it are not refunded.

What timezone is the date in?

The date is stored as an exact moment, and the picker shows it in your browser's local time. That is worth knowing if your team is spread across timezones: someone in another country setting "the 31st at 23:59" is choosing a different instant than you would. If the precise hour matters, agree on it explicitly.