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What Is OCR (Optical Character Recognition)?

OCR (Optical Character Recognition) extracts readable text from images, screenshots, photos, and scanned documents. Instead of manually retyping text from a picture, this tool identifies characters in the image and converts them to selectable, copyable, searchable text. It works with photos, screenshots, scanned PDFs, handwritten notes (with clear handwriting), and more.

Common OCR Use Cases

Use OCR to extract text from screenshots of chat messages, error logs, or UI mockups. Digitize printed documents — receipts, invoices, business cards, and letters. Convert PDF scans into editable text for reformatting or translation. Copy code from screenshots shared in forums or tutorials.

How to Use This Tool

  1. Upload an image — Drag and drop or click to upload an image containing text. Supported formats include PNG, JPEG, WebP, and more.
  2. Wait for processing — The OCR engine analyzes the image and identifies text regions. Processing typically takes a few seconds.
  3. Review extracted text — The recognized text appears in an editable text area. Review it for accuracy and make any needed corrections.
  4. Copy or download — Copy the extracted text to your clipboard, or download it as a plain text file for further use.

Tips and Best Practices

Frequently Asked Questions

What image formats are supported?+
The tool accepts PNG, JPEG, WebP, GIF, and BMP images. For best results, use high-resolution PNG or JPEG images with clear, legible text.
Does this work with handwritten text?+
OCR works best with printed or typed text. Clear, consistent handwriting may be recognized, but messy or cursive handwriting will have lower accuracy.
Is my image uploaded to a server?+
No — all OCR processing happens in your browser using Tesseract.js. Your images never leave your device, making it safe for sensitive documents.
What languages are supported?+
The default engine supports English text. Many OCR libraries support additional languages — check the tool's language selector for available options.
How accurate is the text extraction?+
Accuracy depends on image quality, font clarity, and contrast. High-resolution images with clean fonts typically achieve 95-99% accuracy. Low-quality photos or unusual fonts may produce more errors.
Can I extract text from a PDF?+
For scanned PDFs (image-based), save individual pages as images first, then upload them here. For text-based PDFs, use our PDF Text Extractor which extracts embedded text directly.

Built by Derek Giordano · Part of Ultimate Design Tools

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