OCR Scanned PDF Online
Run optical character recognition on a scanned PDF, turn images into searchable text.
100% free, no signup. Your file is processed entirely in your browser and never uploaded, then e-sign in one click when you are ready.
Open the OCR Scanned PDF tool →
Drop your document here and sign it now. PDF, Word and Excel all work: a .docx or .xlsx is laid out in your browser exactly as it was written, so there is nothing to convert first. Add a signature, a date, a company stamp or a watermark, then download it sealed. Free to start, no account, and the file is never uploaded to open it.
How to ocr scanned pdf in 3 steps
- Upload your PDF, Open the OCR Scanned PDF tool and add your PDF. Files are processed in your browser and never uploaded.
- OCR Scanned PDF, Run optical character recognition on a scanned PDF, turn images into searchable text.
- Download, Download your file instantly, 100% free, no signup, no watermark.
Turning a picture of words into words
A scanned document contains no text. It contains an image of text, which is why searching it finds nothing, why you cannot copy a paragraph out of it, and why a screen reader has nothing to read. OCR looks at the pixels and writes a text layer underneath them, so the page looks identical and becomes searchable.
Accuracy is decided almost entirely by the scan rather than by the software. Clean black text on white paper, scanned straight at 300 DPI, is read close to perfectly. A photograph taken at an angle in poor light, or a fax-quality copy, is not, and no OCR recovers detail that was never captured.
What to do with the result
Treat OCR output as a reading of the page rather than the page. For search and accessibility it is excellent. For anything where a wrong figure matters, check the numbers against the image before acting on them: the characters most often confused are the ones that matter most in a financial document.
If you are redacting a scanned document, remember that OCR has now put the words into the file as text. Redacting the image without removing the text layer leaves the words sitting there for anybody who copies the page.
Frequently asked questions
Is the OCR Scanned PDF tool free?
Yes. OCR Scanned PDF is 100% free with no signup. Your file is processed entirely in your browser and never uploaded to a server.
Do I need to install anything?
No. It runs in any modern browser on desktop or mobile, no app, no plugin, no account.
Is my file private?
Yes. Files are processed locally in your browser, so they never leave your device.
Why is the OCR wrong in places?
Because it is reading pixels. Low resolution, skew, poor contrast, handwriting and unusual fonts all reduce accuracy, and a better scan improves the result more than any setting.
Does OCR change how the page looks?
No. The text layer sits invisibly behind the image, so the page looks exactly as it did and becomes searchable.
Can I edit a scanned document after OCR?
You can edit the text layer, which is not the same as editing the page: the picture of the words stays as it is. For a scan, the honest options are to redact and annotate rather than to rewrite.