Skip to the converter

OCR PDF, without the upload.

Read the pages of a scanned PDF and add the text behind them, so you can search and copy it. Contracts, payslips and ID scans stay on your device.

  • Free, no sign-up
  • Skips pages with text
  • Many languages

Drop a scanned PDF

or choose from your computer paste with Ctrl V

Ready · PDF files · several at once0 bytes uploaded, ever

How to make a scanned PDF searchable

  1. Add your PDF

    Drop it above or choose it.

  2. Pick the languages

    English is chosen, with the language of your browser. Change them, or pick up to three if the pages mix them.

  3. Download the searchable copy

    Press Make searchable. The pages look the same, with a hidden text layer added. Stop and save keeps what has been read so far.

What stays and what doesn't

The pages look the same afterwards. These are the things that do not come along to the new file:

A digital signature is removed, only after you say so: any change to a signed file breaks the signature, so the file is held back until you choose to continue.

Print, copy and edit restrictions are removed, only after you say so: the file is held back until you choose to continue.

When it won't run

Five things stop a run before it writes anything, and each is said on the file's row. A PDF that needs a password asks for it there, and a wrong password is refused with a sentence that says so. A digitally signed PDF is held back until you choose to continue, because reading it would break the signature. A file that cannot be read is reported as damaged. A job too large for this device says so, and in every case nothing is changed and your original stays as it was.

  • The PDF opens, but its owner has switched off printing, copying or editing. Reading it would remove those restrictions.Remove the restrictions and continue
  • A whole number of pixels from 1 to 16383.
  • The model could not start on this device.
  • No text could be found on the pages that were read. Your file is unchanged.

Making a PDF searchable: what to expect

The reading is done by Tesseract, a text recognition engine, running on your device. The first time you read in a language, your browser fetches the engine and that language from this site, then keeps them. The file itself is never sent anywhere.

Pages that already have text are skipped by default, so a mixed file is not read twice. The text is added as an invisible layer on top of each page that is read, set word by word where the word is on the picture. The page looks as it did, and a search or a selection finds the words.

Printed text works best. Handwriting, curly fonts and text over a busy picture are hard, and some of it will be wrong. Pages are read as they are shown, so a page that was scanned sideways or upside down should be turned first. Always check names and numbers against the page.

Questions

Are my PDFs uploaded?

No. Your PDFs are processed inside your browser, on your own phone or computer, and saved straight from this page. The reading at the top of the page counts every byte sent, and it stays at 0 B.

Does it change how the pages look?

No. The text is added as an invisible layer and the picture of the page is not touched. A page that was skipped is not touched at all.

Which pages does it read?

Pages with no text, by default. A page counts as having text when it holds a paragraph or more, so a scan with only a page number is still read. You can read every page, or type the pages you want.

How long does it take, and what does it download?

The first reading fetches the engine and your language, a few megabytes, and keeps them. After that the time depends on your device and the number of pages: a computer reads a page in a few seconds, a phone takes longer. Accurate draws each page larger than Fast, which is quicker.

Can it read handwriting or a photo of a page?

Not reliably. It is built for printed text on a flat page. For a photo, scan it with Scan to PDF first, which straightens and cleans it.

What if I stop part way?

Stop and save ends the reading and keeps the pages that were read. The rest stay as pictures, and the result says how many were not reached.

Can I get the text out as a document?

Once the pages have a text layer, PDF to Word and PDF to text can use it. Those tools read the text that is in the file, so a scan gives nothing until it has been through this one.

More PDF tools

All PDF tools

Other things to do with a PDF

All tools