Recognise text locally
Text recognition is designed as a local step on your Mac.
Learn more
It suits documents you want to process without an external OCR service. The website itself does not process scans.
SCAN & TEXT RECOGNITIONFrom a scan
From a scan
to a search result.
Add a text layer to scanned documents. Local OCR in FileCraft Pro helps you find and reuse content.
UNDERSTANDING OCR
SAMPLE SCAN
Project overview
Documents due on Friday.
Search for: Friday
Image data alone does not provide a text search result.
Interactive example · no PDF processing in your browser. Field contents are not submitted as a form.
This is a schematic explanation, not actual text recognition.
Make scanned PDFs searchable
A scanned page initially contains an image.
Background & details
Words in it are not automatically available to normal text search. Optical character recognition – OCR – analyses the image data and adds recognised text. This turns an image-only document into a PDF in which you can search for specific terms.
Check results carefully
Image quality, language, skew and typography affect recognition.
Learn more
Check important names, amounts and character sequences particularly carefully. OCR results do not replace a professional review of the original document.
Continue working in the document
Search for terms in the generated text layer and use other PDF tools for pages, annotations and output.
Learn more
A searchable text layer is not the same as fully editable text blocks.
Three steps
to your result.
- 01
Prepare the scan
Use legible pages and check orientation and contrast.
- 02
Run OCR
Start local text recognition in the Mac app.
- 03
Check the text
Compare important details and test search in the result.
YOUR NEXT STEPLess reading.
Less reading.
More exploring.
Explore the workflow in the interactive preview.
GOOD TO KNOWQuestions about
Questions about
Scan & OCR.
Is my scan sent to a cloud service?
The OCR workflow described here is designed to run locally on the Mac. The browser example does not process your own files.
Can OCR recognise every text perfectly?
No. Low resolution, unusual fonts, complex tables and handwriting may limit results. Verify important content against the scan.
Is OCR the same as editing PDF text?
No. OCR initially adds recognised text to an image. Editing existing PDF objects is a separate feature area.