OCR — Scan to Text
Turn scans and photos into editable text — 14+ languages including Hindi, Arabic and Chinese, all on your device.
What is the OCR — Scan to Text tool?
The OCR tool reads text out of images and scanned PDFs — documents that look like text but are actually pictures — and turns it into fully editable text. It supports 14+ languages including English, Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Bengali, Tamil and Urdu, and even combined English+Hindi documents. Recognition runs on your device using the open-source Tesseract engine.
Key features
- Reads JPG, PNG and scanned PDF files
- 14+ recognition languages, including English+Hindi combined
- Editable output box — fix, copy, or download as .txt
- Multi-page scans processed page by page with progress
- On-device recognition — private papers never uploaded
How do I use it?
- Drop an image or scanned PDF (several files at once is fine).
- Pick the document’s language — e.g. Hindi, Arabic or English + Hindi.
- Click Scan & extract text; the first scan downloads that language’s data once.
- Edit the recognized text, copy it, or download the .txt.
Is it safe to OCR a document online?
Yes. Recognition is performed by Tesseract.js — the browser build of the well-known open-source OCR engine — running on your own processor. The only network activity is a one-time download of the chosen language’s data pack (a few MB, then cached); your image or scan itself is never transmitted anywhere.
Tips for the best result
- Sharper input = better output: scan at 300 DPI or photograph straight-on in good light.
- Pick the right language — it’s the single biggest accuracy factor.
- Mixed Hindi/English documents: choose “English + Hindi”.
- The first scan per language downloads its data pack once; later scans start instantly.
Frequently asked questions
How do I convert a scanned PDF into editable text?
Drop the scan here, choose its language and click Scan & extract — the recognized text appears in an editable box you can copy or download.
Which languages does the OCR support?
English, Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Russian, Chinese (Simplified), Japanese, Bengali, Tamil, Urdu — plus English+Hindi combined.
Why is my OCR result inaccurate?
Usually image quality or a wrong language selection. Re-shoot straight-on in good light at higher resolution, and double-check the language menu.
Can it read handwriting?
Printed text is the target; neat handwriting sometimes works partially, but accuracy on cursive writing is low — that’s a limit of OCR technology generally.
Does OCR work on photos taken with my phone?
Yes — JPG and PNG photos work; crop to the document and avoid glare for best results.
Is my scan uploaded for recognition?
No. Only the language data pack is downloaded (once); your document is processed entirely on your device.
Related tools: PDF to Text · PDF to Word · JPG to PDF
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🔒 Privacy: this tool runs entirely in your browser. Your file is never uploaded, stored, or shared. LyfPDF offers 22 free PDF tools, including 17 localized tools in 7 languages, with 0 uploads — learn how it works.