What Is OCR? Complete PDF OCR Guide
OCR (optical character recognition) identifies text in images and converts it into machine-readable text that...
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Adds an invisible, searchable/selectable text layer to a scanned PDF. Pages that already have text are left untouched.
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Larger scanned PDFs can take a minute or two to process.
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About OCR PDF
A scanned PDF is really just a set of images — even though it looks like a text document, none of the words are actually selectable, searchable, or copyable, because to the computer, it's just a picture. OCR (Optical Character Recognition) scans those images, recognizes the text within them, and adds a genuine, searchable text layer on top.
This is essential groundwork before converting a scanned PDF to Word or Excel — those conversion tools need real, recognized text to work with, not just pixels. OCR works best on clear, printed or typed text; handwritten text is recognized far less reliably, since handwriting varies too much for consistent automatic recognition.
This is essential groundwork before converting a scanned PDF to Word or Excel — those conversion tools need real, recognized text to work with, not just pixels. OCR works best on clear, printed or typed text; handwritten text is recognized far less reliably, since handwriting varies too much for consistent automatic recognition.
OCR PDF guides
Frequently Asked Questions
What does OCR actually do?
OCR (Optical Character Recognition) scans the text in your scanned pages and makes it selectable and searchable.
Does this work on handwritten text?
OCR works best on printed/typed text; handwriting recognition accuracy is much lower.
Will the original scanned images be preserved?
Yes, this adds a searchable text layer without changing how the pages visually look.
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