QR codes are used for everything from opening a restaurant menu to making payments: point your camera at the QR code and your phone will automatically open the relevant page. But what happens if you receive a QR code in a message? Or what if it’s a screenshot instead?

While the iPhone integrates QR code scanning directly into the Camera app, there’s no option to scan QR codes from a screenshot. That’s where trusted third-party apps and websites come in.

The most reliable and trusted way to scan QR codes from screenshots on iPhone is to use the Google app (which includes the Google Lens feature). There are two ways to do this: you can use the Google Lens scanner or the Share sheet.

First, open the Google app and tap the Camera icon in the search bar, which will open the Google Lens interface. Tap the Photos icon in the lower left corner and choose the image from the list. The Google app will immediately scan the QR code and you will see the result there.