Extract Text From a Photo
Upload a photo and get the text it contains, ready to copy or download. Free, no account, and the file never leaves your device.
Drag your image here or click to choose it
JPG, PNG or WEBP. Processed in your browser, never uploaded to any server.
Snapping a photo of a sign, a printed receipt, or a page from a book is fast, but retyping that text by hand, letter by letter, is not. This tool turns the text inside a photo into real, selectable text you can copy, edit, and paste wherever you need it, without wasting time transcribing anything. All the recognition happens right inside your browser, so the image is never uploaded to a server or passed through anyone else's hands. Because the work runs on your own device instead of a paid cloud service, a large or text-heavy photo can take a bit longer, especially on an older phone.
How to extract text from a photo in 3 steps
Upload your photo
Drag the image into the upload area or pick it from your computer or phone. It accepts photos in JPG, PNG, and WEBP, and opens instantly right there in your browser, without uploading anything to a server while it's processed.
The recognition engine reads the text
The tool uses Tesseract, an open-source OCR engine that runs entirely inside your browser. It scans the image letter by letter and tunes its reading to whatever language you're browsing the site in, without relying on any external server.
Copy or download the result
The result shows up in an editable text box: look it over carefully, fix anything the engine misread, then copy it to your clipboard or download it as a .txt file to keep wherever you like.
When it comes in handy
- You photograph a new contact's business card at a meeting and want their phone number and email as text, instead of typing them in by hand later.
- A student photographs a page from a library book to quote an exact line in an assignment, instead of retyping the whole passage before turning it in.
- Someone finds an old printed document, like an old contract or a years-old invoice, and wants that text digitized without owning a scanner or visiting a print shop.
Frequently asked questions
Does my photo get uploaded to a server?
No. The image is processed entirely inside your own browser, using the Tesseract.js engine running on your device. The photo never travels to any server, ours or anyone else's, and once you close the tab no copy is left anywhere.
Does it work on handwriting, or only printed text?
It works much better on printed text, like a sign, a receipt, or a page from a book. Handwriting, especially cursive, is recognized far less reliably, so it's worth double-checking the result carefully when the photo is of something handwritten.
Why does the text come out with mistakes or swapped letters?
Accuracy depends heavily on the photo itself: a blurry, poorly lit, low-resolution, or steeply angled shot gives worse results. To get a cleaner read, take the photo straight-on, in good light, and as sharp as you can.
Is it free? Is there a limit on how many photos I can process?
It's free with no limit — you can extract text from one photo or twenty in the same day, without creating an account or leaving an email. There's no watermark and no paid tier to unlock, because there are no servers to pay for.
Can I use this on a scanned PDF instead of a photo?
This tool is built for a single photo in JPG, PNG, or WEBP, not for PDF files. If what you actually have is a multi-page scanned PDF, the site's PDF to Word tool is built specifically for that case.