cuere

QR codes in your terminal — the way Claude Code CLI draws its remote-connection codes: Unicode half-blocks, low error correction so the code stays small, a proper quiet zone. Plus a Rich renderable and helpers for crypto-wallet URIs.

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Demo

Recorded with vhs from examples/demo.tape — regenerate with uv run python scripts/render_demo.py (needs vhs, ttyd, and ffmpeg):

cuere "https://github.com/IvanAnishchuk/cuere"   # a first code
cuere --invert "HELLO"                            # light-on-dark
cuere --optimize-uri "bitcoin:bc1q..."            # smaller wallet code
cuere --mode ansi "cuere"                         # theme-proof colors

📖 Full documentation: ivananishchuk.github.io/cuere

Install

uv add cuere          # or: pip install cuere
uv add 'cuere[image]' # optional: adds PNG export (pulls in Pillow)

Use

from cuere import render, show, fits

payload = "wc:7f6e504b...@2?relay-protocol=irn&symKey=587d..."
show(payload)                                       # prints to stdout
text = render("HELLO", mode="block", invert=True)   # returns a str
if not fits(payload):                               # does it fit the terminal?
    ...

With Rich (centering, panels, layouts):

from rich.console import Console
from rich.panel import Panel
from cuere.rich import QRCode

Console().print(Panel(QRCode("bitcoin:BC1Q..."), title="scan to pay"), justify="center")

Wallet URIs — bitcoin_uri() builds a validated BIP-21 bitcoin: payment request, lightning_uri() wraps a bech32 Lightning payload (BOLT11 invoice / LNURL / BOLT12 offer) in a lightning: URI, and optimize_uri() uppercases a fully lowercase bitcoin: or lightning: URI (bech32 is case-insensitive per BIP-173) so it encodes in QR alphanumeric mode, yielding a smaller code. scheme_case() exposes the typed SchemeCase that decides this: case-significant schemes (ethereum: EIP-55 checksums, wc: WalletConnect), mixed-case URIs, and URIs with non-alphanumeric query parts are returned unchanged:

from decimal import Decimal
from cuere import bitcoin_uri, lightning_uri, optimize_uri, show

show(optimize_uri(bitcoin_uri("bc1q...")))                  # smaller, scannable code
bitcoin_uri("bc1q...", amount=Decimal("0.01"), label="Tip") # -> "bitcoin:bc1q...?amount=0.01&label=Tip"
optimize_uri("bitcoin:bc1q...")                             # -> "BITCOIN:BC1Q..."
optimize_uri(lightning_uri("lnbc1..."))                     # -> "LIGHTNING:LNBC1..."

For Ethereum, ethereum_uri() and erc20_transfer_uri() build EIP-681 ethereum: requests — a native payment (value in wei) or an ERC-20 transfer. Their EIP-55 checksums are case-significant, so these URIs are never passed through optimize_uri:

from cuere import erc20_transfer_uri, ethereum_uri

ethereum_uri("0xfb69...d359", value=10**16, chain_id=1)         # -> "ethereum:0xfb69...d359@1?value=10000000000000000"
erc20_transfer_uri("0xA0b8...eB48", to="0x8e23...d052", amount=1_000_000)  # -> "ethereum:0xA0b8...eB48/transfer?address=0x8e23...d052&uint256=1000000"

See the wallet cookbook for the full payment-request recipes, and the BIP-21 / Lightning / EIP-681 summaries for the formats and the optimize_uri scheme model.

Need the raw module grid (to render it yourself or inspect it)? Encode to a QRMatrix:

from cuere import QRMatrix

m = QRMatrix.encode("HELLO", error="L", border=4)
m.modules   # tuple[tuple[bool, ...], ...] — True is a dark module
m.size      # side length, quiet zone included

Export to a file or bytes — save() writes the chosen format (inferred from the path suffix when not given), render_bytes() returns the raw bytes:

from cuere import save, render_bytes

save("HELLO", "code.svg")                       # vector SVG, format from suffix
save("bitcoin:BC1Q...", "pay.png", scale=8)     # raster PNG (needs cuere[image])
png_bytes = render_bytes("HELLO", format="png") # -> bytes, no file

The formats are text (the terminal rendering), svg, and png (needs the cuere[image] extra). See the exporting recipe and output formats for the full model.

CLI:

cuere "wc:...your walletconnect uri..."
echo "some payload" | cuere
cuere --input payload.txt              # read the payload from a file
cuere 12345 --micro                    # compact Micro QR for a tiny payload
cuere HELLO --mode ansi --invert --border 2 --error M
cuere HELLO --mode ansi --dark "#1a1a1a" --light "#fafafa"   # custom ANSI colors
cuere HELLO --output svg:code.svg      # write SVG to a file (default stays terminal)
cuere HELLO -o png:- --scale 8 > code.png   # PNG to stdout (needs cuere[image])

Rendering modes

mode	one module is	width of a v2 code	notes
half (default)	½ character (▀▄█)	33 cols	survives copy-paste; inherits terminal colors
ansi	½ character, colored (black-on-white default)	33 cols	theme-proof; customizable colors; show() downgrades it to half when piped or NO_COLOR is set
block	2 characters (██)	66 cols	most font-robust, twice as wide

The block-drawing glyphs (█▀▄) are East-Asian Ambiguous width: a terminal configured to render those double-width will widen the output, so the column counts above assume standard single-width rendering.

ansi mode's colors are customizable: pass dark / light to render / show (and cuere.rich.QRCode, and the CLI --dark / --light flags) to set the dark-module and light-ground colors — a name, a 256-palette index, or a truecolor hex / (r, g, b) value. They default to spec-correct black-on-white. Colors are ansi-only (passing them to half / block raises ColorError). See terminal colors for the forms and the scanner-contrast caveats.

Scanning notes

• On dark terminals the default mode shows an inverted code (light modules on dark). Modern phone cameras handle this; for a stubborn scanner pass invert=True / --invert, or use mode="ansi" for spec-correct polarity.
• Error correction defaults to L: screens don't get dirty or torn, and lower correction means a smaller code that fits your terminal.
• The quiet zone (4 modules) is part of the output on purpose — don't strip the "blank" margins.

Development

uv sync                  # editable install via meson-python
uv run pytest            # 100% branch coverage enforced
uv run ruff check && uv run mypy src/ tests/ && uv run ty check && uv run basedpyright
uv run pre-commit install --install-hooks

Build-system notes (meson-python):

• Every shipped file must be listed in src/cuere/meson.build — meson does not glob. tests/test_packaging.py fails if the list drifts.
• The version lives only in the root meson.build.
• sdists are produced from committed files (meson dist); commit before uv build.

License

CC0-1.0 — public domain.