> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.qrtub.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Creating Your First Link

> A worked end-to-end path: create a Collection, add an Item, get a Link, download its QR code, and give it somewhere to go.

This walks one complete path from an empty account to a QR code you can print and scan. It is
not the only order that works — Collections, Items, Links and Pages are independent, so
creating a hundred Links first and connecting them months later is equally valid.

**Before you start:** you need a QRtub account and a team selected in the team switcher at the
top of the sidebar. Parts of the app still say "tub" where these docs say "Collection" — the
entity was renamed and the labels have not all caught up.

## Create a Collection

In the sidebar, click the **+** next to the section labeled **Tub** — the old name for
Collections, still on the button. The **New tub** screen it opens offers two cards —
*Connects to one destination* and *Connects to several* — plus a row of starter templates.

Picking any of them creates the Collection immediately. There is no form: the Collection gets
an automatic sequential name (`Tub1`, `Tub2`, and so on) and you land on its empty grid, where
the name, description and cover image are all editable in place. The two cards set what a
scanned code does by default — pass through to one destination, or open a Page listing
several — and that is changeable later in settings.

## Add an Item and get a Link

Click **Add your first item**, give it a name, and save. Collections created this way default
to random link generation, so QRtub mints a Link at the moment the Item is saved and confirms
it with a message naming the new slug.

To see it, open the Item and switch to its **Access Links** tab — the full URL is listed there,
in the form `qrtub.com/r/x5fgd`. An Item can hold more than one Link.

If a Collection's link generation is set to *None* — the default for older Collections — saving
an Item mints no Link, and you attach one yourself as below.

## Or start from a Link you already printed

Open **Access Link** in the sidebar and click **Create Link**. Choose a strategy — Random,
Numbered, or Custom — and for Random you can create up to 100 in one request. Nothing needs to
exist first: a Link with no Item and no destination is a valid, permanent, printable
Link.

To connect one, use the row menu on any Link and choose **Assign to Item**; the picker searches
the whole team, so the Item can live in any Collection. An Item's **Access Links** tab works
from the other direction, listing the team's unassigned Links so you can attach a pre-printed
code there.

## Download the QR code

From a Link's row menu, choose **Download QR Code**. You get a single PNG at 1024 px, black on
white, with a 2-module quiet zone; select several Links first and you get a zip of PNGs
instead. There is no SVG export and no error-correction setting today.

## Point the Link at something

Open the Item and use the **Destination** tab to set where a scan goes, or the **Page** tab to
build a screen with several Destinations. Either can be changed at any time without
touching the printed code.

A Destination can be a fixed URL or a template that inserts this Item's own field values, so
one template serves every Item in the Collection. Values are inserted exactly as stored — no
URL-encoding — so a field containing a space or an `&` breaks the resulting link.

## Related

* [What a Link Is](/links/what-a-link-is) — the slug-to-destination model
* [Choosing a Link Type](/links/choosing-a-link-type) — random vs. numbered vs. custom
* [Field Bindings & URL Templates](/destinations/field-bindings) — the `{{ }}` syntax and its rules
* [The Print-First Workflow](/print-first/overview) — printing in bulk before the Items exist