What is OCR?
OCR uses AI to recognize text in images. It analyzes the shapes of letters and converts them into digital text. The tool is intended primarily for clear printed text; handwriting may be less reliable.
How to OCR an image
- Open PDFly's OCR Image tool.
- Upload your image — JPG, PNG, or WebP.
- Click process to extract the text.
- Copy the extracted text from the results panel.
When to use OCR
- Document digitization: Convert paper documents to digital text.
- Screenshots: Extract text from screenshots of text.
- Translation: Extract text to translate into another language.
- Data entry: Avoid manual typing from photos.
Troubleshooting
- "Please select a JPEG, PNG, or WEBP image": Other image formats (like HEIC or GIF) aren't accepted directly — convert with Image Converter first.
- Large images fail or get rejected: Image data is capped at roughly 2.2 MB per request. Compress the image with Image Compressor before uploading.
- "Could not process this image": The file may be corrupted or in an unsupported color mode. Try re-saving it as a standard JPEG or PNG first.
- "Something went wrong. Please try again": The AI service may be briefly busy or the shared daily AI capacity may have been reached. Wait a moment and retry.
- The text came out in the wrong language or garbled: There's no manual language selector — the model reads whatever language appears in the image. Mixed-language or very stylized text can reduce accuracy.
Need to extract text from an image?
Extract text from your image — no signup, sent to the configured AI provider for processing.
↑ Use the tool above
Frequently Asked Questions
How accurate is image OCR?
Accuracy depends on image quality and text clarity. Clean, high-resolution images work best.
Can OCR read handwriting?
Legible handwriting may be recognized, but results can vary more than with clear printed text. Review the extracted text carefully.
What languages are supported?
There's no language setting to choose — the AI model reads whatever language appears in the image automatically. Results are generally strongest for widely-used languages.