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QR Checkpoint Hunt: Run a Scavenger Hunt with a Live Leaderboard

Print a QR poster for each checkpoint. Participants scan with their phone camera — no app, no account — and every check-in earns points on a live leaderboard.

A QR Checkpoint Hunt turns any venue into a game. You add a checkpoint for every place you want people to visit — booths, rooms, stops around campus — and print one QR poster per checkpoint. Participants scan any poster with their phone camera, enter their name once, and every check-in earns points on a live leaderboard. No app and no account for participants.

How it works

For you, the organizer:

  1. Create a hunt — it starts with three example checkpoints you can rename.
  2. Add a checkpoint for every place you want people to visit, each worth the points you choose.
  3. Print the QR posters — one page per checkpoint, plus a How-to-play poster — and put one up at each spot.
  4. Open the hunt when your event starts. Until then, anyone who scans sees "this hunt isn't open right now".

For each participant:

  1. They scan any QR poster with their phone camera — every checkpoint is a starting point.
  2. At their first check-in they enter their name (and any optional details). That's the only form they ever see.
  3. Every later scan is a one-tap check-in. After each one they see their progress, score, and rank — and a link to the live leaderboard.

The check-in form

The first time someone scans one of your posters, a short form signs them up: their name (required) plus a few optional fields — typically email and organization. After that, their phone remembers them and checking in is a single tap.

Only the name ever appears on the public leaderboard. The optional fields are visible to you alone — on your hunt admin page and in the CSV export. The fields are set on your account, not per hunt: email us and we'll change them for you.

Points and winners

Each checkpoint awards its points the first time a participant checks in there — scanning the same poster twice never double-counts. Changing a checkpoint's points applies to future check-ins; deleting a checkpoint keeps the points people already earned there.

A hunt is a passport, not a race: everyone who completes all checkpoints earns the same total, so all finishers share the top spot. If you want a single winner, weight the checkpoints differently — say, a high-value final checkpoint that's only put up near the end — or draw a winner from the finishers.

The live leaderboard

Your hunt has a public live leaderboard that updates as participants check in. Open its link on a TV or projector at the entrance for extra motivation — and for the final reveal. See Leaderboards on a TV.

Watching check-ins arrive

Your hunt admin page shows who has checked in where — one row per participant, one column per checkpoint — along with each participant's details and score. From there you can also remove a participant or reset the hunt entirely (printed QR posters stay valid after a reset).

When the event is over, flip the hunt to closed and export the CSV: each participant's details, one column per checkpoint, and totals — your attendee list to take home.

Limits

  • Free: up to 25 participants and 10 checkpoints per hunt
  • Plus: up to 100 participants and 100 checkpoints per hunt
  • Pro: up to 1000 participants and 100 checkpoints per hunt

When a hunt is full, the check-in page tells participants to find the organizer instead of failing silently.

Looking for participants to add themselves to a regular leaderboard — without checkpoints or scanning for points? That's Quick Join.

Getting started

Create a scavenger hunt

Setup takes about five minutes: create the hunt, rename the example checkpoints, print the posters, and open the hunt when your event starts.