Published on: 6/12/2026 by Alex Suzuki

GS1 DataBar Limited

The GS1 DataBar family of symbologies specified in ISO/IEC 24724 has been supported by the STRICH Barcode Scanning SDK for a long time, with one exception: GS1 DataBar Limited.

GS1 DataBar Limited is designed for very small items that won’t be scanned at the point of sale, e.g. healthcare products, pharmaceuticals, and other things that come in small packages. At just 79 modules wide with a minimum height of 10X, it’s the most space-efficient DataBar variant, but it can only encode GTIN-14s with an indicator digit of 0 or 1.

The sample barcode below encodes the GTIN (01)123456789012:

A GS1 DataBar Limited symbol encoding the GTIN '(01)123456789012'

Reading GS1 DataBar Limited barcode is enabled by passing the databar-lim symbology identifier in the Engine configuration. For more information, refer to our symbology documentation on GS1 DataBar.

Sample code for reading GS1 DataBar Limited using PopupScanner

The snippet below shows how to scan GS1 DataBar Limited symbols using the SDK’s PopupScanner integration.

import {StrichSDK, PopupScanner} from "https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/@pixelverse/strichjs-sdk@latest";

// ... SDK initialization code ...
await StrichSDK.init('<your license key>');

const detections = await PopupScanner.scan({
  engine: {
      symbologies: ["databar-lim"]
  }
});

Improved PDF417 Recognition Rates

Our PDF417 decoder needed a refresh, and it got one.

Thanks to one of our customers who provided a real-life dataset to benchmark against, we were able to improve the detection rate of complex PDF417 barcodes, such as the ones used on US driving licenses. In addition, vertically aligned PDF417 barcodes, although uncommon, are now detected as well.

But we are not done yet: expect more improvements in the future.

Under-the-Hood Improvements

In addition to the above, we applied the usual spit and polish: updating our dependencies and under-the-hood improvements to the code structure. Most significantly, we updated to the latest version of the Emscripten WebAssembly compiler.