OCR PDF
Extract text from scanned or image-based PDFs.
Drop your file here, or browse
Scanned PDF — max 50 MB · takes 10–30 s
How it works
- 1
Upload your scanned or image-based PDF
- 2
Tesseract OCR reads every page at 300 DPI
- 3
Download a .txt file with all extracted text
Features
- Powered by Tesseract, the industry-standard OCR engine
- 300 DPI page rendering for accuracy
- Works on scanned documents and image-based PDFs
- No signup required
- Files deleted immediately after processing
How to Make a Scanned PDF Searchable
Upload your scanned PDF to Papyrio. Tesseract reads every page as an image at 300 DPI and extracts the text it finds. Download a .txt file with the full content: searchable, copyable, and ready to paste into another document.
What OCR Actually Does
A scanned PDF is a picture of a page, not text. There's nothing to select, search, or copy. OCR (Optical Character Recognition) analyzes the image pixel by pixel and reconstructs the characters it recognizes, turning a flat image into usable text.
How Accurate Is OCR?
Accuracy depends almost entirely on scan quality. Clean, high-contrast scans at 300 DPI or higher produce very accurate results. Below 150 DPI, or with skewed, blurry, or low-contrast scans, error rates climb. Tesseract reads printed text only; handwriting isn't supported.
OCR vs PDF to Text: Which Do You Need?
If your PDF already has selectable text (you can click and highlight words in a normal PDF reader), it doesn't need OCR. Use PDF to Text instead for instant, accurate extraction. OCR only matters when the PDF is a scan or photo with no underlying text layer.
Already have a digital PDF? Try PDF to Text →What Affects OCR Quality
Resolution matters most: scan at 300 DPI or higher whenever possible. Page skew (slight rotation from the scanner) also hurts accuracy; most scanners have a deskew option worth enabling before you scan. OCR PDF currently supports English text.
What to Do After Running OCR
Once you have the extracted text, paste it into a Word document to reformat it, or use the original scanned PDF for a fully editable conversion if the scan quality was high enough.
Convert the scan to an editable Word file →Want to edit the extracted text in Word? Convert to Word after OCR →
Need to translate the scanned document? Translate PDF supports 25+ languages →
Just need the plain text? PDF to Text is faster for digital PDFs →
Frequently asked questions
What is OCR?
OCR (Optical Character Recognition) reads text from images. If your PDF is a scan or a photo of a document, the text isn't selectable, so OCR extracts it so you can copy, search, and edit it.
How do I make a scanned PDF searchable?
Upload the scanned PDF here. Tesseract reads every page at 300 DPI and outputs a .txt file with all the extracted text. For a searchable PDF (text layer embedded), that's on our roadmap.
How accurate is it?
Tesseract accuracy depends on scan quality. Clean, high-contrast scans at 300 DPI or above typically produce very accurate results. Low-res or skewed scans may have more errors.
What languages are supported?
Currently English. Multi-language OCR is on our roadmap.
How long does it take?
Roughly 2–3 seconds per page. A 10-page document takes 20–30 seconds.
My PDF already has selectable text. Do I need OCR?
No. If you can already click and highlight text in your PDF, OCR won't improve it. Use our PDF to Text tool instead to extract it cleanly.
Do I need to sign up?
No account required. Guests get one conversion per day; free accounts get 10.
Is my file safe?
Your PDF is processed in memory and deleted the moment the text file is returned. Nothing is stored.