CardQR vs Popl: 2026 comparison (price, approach and features)
Popl has repositioned toward sales teams and event lead capture, and no longer publishes prices. CardQR is self-service, with public pricing and a permanent free plan. What each does better, verified in August 2026.
Popl and CardQR no longer target the same customer. In 2026 Popl presents itself as a contact capture platform for events aimed at sales teams—credential scanning, data enrichment, CRM synchronization, SSO—and does not publish prices: you have to request a demo. CardQR is self-service: you sign up, use the free plan and, if you need more, you pay €2.99 per month without talking to anyone.
This comparison was verified on August 22, 2026 on Popl's public website. The table only includes what can be verified on both sides; where Popl does not publish data we say so, rather than estimate it.
Comparison table
| Feature | CardQR | Popl |
|---|---|---|
| Public pricing | Permanent free plan. Pro €2.99/month or €29.90/year. Enterprise €12.99/month | Not published: their website asks you to request pricing |
| How to sign up | Registration and online payment, no sales team | Demo with their sales team |
| Target audience | Individual professionals and teams | Sales teams and large accounts |
| Digital business cards | Unlimited on all plans, including free | Yes (they don't publish limits per plan) |
| Lead capture | Form on the card with CSV export, from Pro onwards | Yes, it's the core of their product |
| Event credential scanner | No | Yes |
| SOC 2 certification | No | Yes, SOC 2 Type II |
| Interface languages | 8 (Spanish, English, French, German, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese and Chinese) | Multilingual, without specifying which ones |
The fundamental difference: self-service versus sales process
The fact that Popl doesn't publish prices is not an oversight, it's a model decision: their own pricing page includes a frequently asked question titled why the price doesn't appear on the website. They sell to teams, with dedicated onboarding, account management and a cycle that starts with a twenty-five minute demo.
For a company with thirty salespeople going to trade shows, that support is worth money. For a freelancer, a consultant or a team of five people, it means you can't even find out what it would cost without scheduling a call. CardQR goes the other way: the price is published, the free plan never expires and the subscription can be activated and cancelled from the dashboard.
Where Popl is the better choice
It's worth saying clearly, because there are cases where we're not the answer. Popl has a universal event credential scanner, automated company data enrichment, SOC 2 Type II certification, single sign-on and synchronization with HR directories. If your problem is that twenty salespeople come back from a conference with scanned credentials that need to go into Salesforce, that's their specialty and not ours.
CardQR doesn't scan event credentials and doesn't have SOC 2. It scans paper business cards with OCR, captures leads from the card itself and exports to CSV or your CRM via webhook.
What CardQR includes for free
The free plan is not a fourteen-day trial. It includes unlimited digital cards, each with its own URL, downloadable QR code and statistics; activation of generic NFC tags—the ones you buy anywhere, with no mandatory catalog; Tap to Connect contact exchange; email signature generator for Gmail, Outlook and Apple Mail; contact wallet with OCR scanner for paper business cards; and AI-powered content generator. No credit card and no ads.
Having multiple free cards is not a minor detail: personal and business card, one per line of work if you're a freelancer, a specific one for a trade show with event mode, one public and another private with code for clients.
What you get by paying for CardQR
Pro - €2.99/month or €29.90/year
- Lead Capture: form on the card with required name and email, and optional phone, company and message. Leads arrive at a dashboard with filters and CSV export, and each one records country, city and source link.
- Widgets: link button, bookings, video and downloadable PDF. The bookings widget connects to Calendly, Cal.com, HubSpot, Google, Microsoft, TidyCal, SavvyCal or your own link.
- Security code: 8-character PIN that makes the card private; regenerates whenever you want without changing the URL or reprinting the QR code.
- Advanced analytics: device and browser, country, region and city, referrer and the five UTM parameters, visit duration, scroll percentage, twelve types of actions measured separately and bot filtering.
- Event Mode, premium templates, block design, 50 AI generations per month, 50 OCR scans and no CardQR Powered By banner.
Enterprise - €12.99/month or €129.90/year
Flat rate, not per user. Custom domain with SSL, Team Dashboard with four roles and up to 10 seats included, webhooks signed with HMAC-SHA256 to your CRM (lead.created and connection.created), HubSpot integration, API with your own keys (100 reads per minute, 30 writes), reusable profiles that sync data across all associated cards and bulk import via CSV or Excel.
Details that don't appear in any table
Three things that you only appreciate once you're inside. First: on CardQR no card is indexed by Google by default—it's a decision you activate manually and, besides, the card has to pass five quality checks before it can appear in search engines. Second: the interface is in eight languages and the product is developed in Spain, with its own GDPR section for access and deletion requests. Third: on paid plans, Apple Wallet and Google Wallet passes are generated, so your contact can stay on the other person's phone without installing anything.
What makes sense for each
- Choose CardQR if you're an independent professional or a small team, if you want to know what you're paying before talking to anyone, if you need more than one card, or if you're interested in Lead Capture, security code or detailed analytics for less than three euros a month.
- Consider Popl if your team lives from trade shows and conferences and needs credential scanning, data enrichment and SOC 2, or if you're already operating on their platform and migration isn't worth it.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Popl cost?
They don't publish it. Their pricing page asks you to request a quote and explains in their FAQ why the price doesn't appear on the website. Any specific figure you find on a comparison site is from third parties, not from Popl. Verified August 22, 2026.
Do I need to buy anything to use CardQR?
No. The QR code is downloaded from the dashboard and works on any printed or digital medium. If you want NFC, generic tags work and are activated from the dashboard; there's no mandatory catalog.
Can I have a personal card and a business card on the free plan?
Yes, and as many as you need. Cards are unlimited on all plans, each with its own URL and QR code.
What happens if I stop paying for the Pro plan?
The account reverts to the free plan. The cards remain active and accessible at their URLs; paid features are disabled until you reactivate the subscription. Nothing is deleted.
Is the data in this comparison up to date?
CardQR data comes from the product itself. Popl data comes from their public website and is dated above. Products change: always check each service's website before signing up.