The chart below visually shows the size difference in popular barcode types. The barcode symbols below are all encoding the same data of “BARCODE12345678” in the 2D chart, with the same narrow bar width or X dimension of 10 mils. Of all the symbologies evaluated, Data Matrix was able to encode the most data, in the smallest amount of space.
| Linear and 2D Barcode Symbology Evaluation Chart | |
Code 39 without check digit: | Code 128 Auto: |
Aztec: | Data Matrix ECC200 with ASCII encoding mode: |
PDF417 in Text encoding mode: | QR-Code with Error Correction L |
| Linear Numbers Only Comparison (Encoding 123456789012) | |
Code 39 without check digit: | Code 128 Set C: |
Codabar without check digit: | Interleaved 2 of 5 without check digit: |