OCR a PDF — make scans searchable
Turn a scanned PDF into one you can select, search and copy from. The pages look exactly the same — the recognised text sits invisibly on top. Seven languages, free, and nothing leaves your browser.
Drop a scanned PDF, or browse
A scan is a picture, not a document
When a page comes off a scanner, the PDF holds an image of it. To your eyes it is a document; to every piece of software it is a photograph. Ctrl+F finds nothing, no sentence can be selected, and an archive of a thousand such files is unsearchable.
OCR closes that gap. It reads the picture, recognises the characters, and writes them back into the same PDF as an invisible layer aligned with the printed words. Nothing on the page moves; the document simply starts answering searches.
Mixed documents keep their quality
Most real files are mixed: a typed cover page, a scanned contract, a typed appendix. Pages that already contain text are copied from your original untouched — same vectors, same fonts, same file weight — and only the scanned ones are rebuilt. You never lose quality on a page that did not need OCR.
If you want the text out instead
This tool keeps the document and adds text to it. When you want the content itself — to quote, edit or hand to an AI tool — use PDF to Text for the words alone or PDF to Markdown to keep headings and lists as well. Both run the same OCR on the same pages. To get the best out of any of them, the scanned PDF guide explains what actually improves accuracy, in order.
Frequently asked questions
What does OCR do to my PDF?
It looks at each scanned page as an image, recognises the characters, and writes them into the PDF as an invisible text layer sitting exactly over the printed words. The page looks identical, but you can now select, search and copy the text — and so can any other software.
Does it change how the document looks?
No. Pages that already contain text are copied from your original untouched, at full quality. Scanned pages keep the same image with the text layer added on top.
Which languages are supported?
English, French, Spanish, German, Portuguese, Italian, Arabic. Pick the language of the document before converting — recognition uses a language model, so the wrong choice measurably lowers accuracy, especially on accented text.
Searchable PDF or plain text — which do I want?
A searchable PDF when the document must stay a document: contracts, invoices, archives you need to keep as they are but be able to search. Plain text or Markdown when you want the content out of it, to edit, quote or feed to another tool.
Why is the file bigger afterwards?
Recognised pages are rebuilt from the image the engine read, and the text layer adds its own data. The increase is usually modest. Pages that already had text add nothing, because they are copied as they were.
Is anything uploaded?
No. The OCR engine, its language data and the PDF writer all run in your browser, and the engine is served from this site rather than a third-party CDN. Scanned documents are exactly the kind of file that should not be handed to a server.
Limitations
- Handwriting is not recognised reliably — this engine is built for printed text.
- One language per document. A page mixing scripts will lose whichever is not selected.
- Recognised pages are rebuilt from the rendered image, so a scanned page comes back at the resolution the engine read (about 144 dpi), not the scanner's original.
- Large scanned documents take a few seconds per page; progress is shown and the job can be cancelled.
- Encrypted PDFs must be unlocked first.
Related tools
- Image to TextRead the text in a photo or screenshot, in seven languages.PNG, JPEG, WebP, GIF, BMP, TIFF → Text (.txt)
- PDF to TextPlain text from any PDF, with OCR for scanned pages.PDF → Text (.txt)
- PDF to MarkdownClean Markdown from any PDF, with OCR for scanned pages.PDF → Markdown (.md)
- Split PDF for AICut a PDF into parts NotebookLM, ChatGPT or Claude will accept.PDF → PDF parts, ZIP
Guides
- OCR vs Text Extraction: Which One Does Your PDF Need?Some PDFs contain text, others only pictures of text. How to tell them apart in ten seconds, and which tool each one needs.
- Extract Text From a Scanned PDF - Step-by-Step GuideExtract text from a scanned PDF free with browser-based OCR - identify scans, run recognition, understand how OCR works, and fix the predictable errors.
- How to Convert PDF to Markdown (Step-by-Step Guide)Learn how to convert PDF to Markdown with online tools, Pandoc, or by hand. Covers tables, scanned PDFs, OCR, and tips for getting clean, usable output.