Extract text from scanned PDFs and make them searchable. Auto-detects document language. 100% local — nothing uploaded.
Extract text from scanned PDFs, make them searchable, and copy content — directly in your browser using OCR (Optical Character Recognition). No software to install, no account required, and your files never leave your device.
PDFree auto-detects the language of your document before running OCR, so you don't have to guess — it works on scanned contracts, textbooks, invoices, and archive documents in dozens of languages and scripts.
Drag and drop or click Choose PDF. PDFree automatically detects whether your PDF already has a text layer or is a pure scanned image.
For scanned PDFs: click Install OCR Engine to load Tesseract.js (~17 MB, one-time download). PDFree samples the page and suggests the document's language automatically; you can override it from the dropdown if needed. Text-layer PDFs skip this step entirely.
The text recognition engine processes each page locally — nothing is uploaded. A progress bar shows estimated time remaining.
Your PDF downloads automatically when text recognition finishes. The original appearance is unchanged; only an invisible text layer is added so you can search, select, and copy text in any PDF reader.
OCR is useful any time you have a document as an image and need to work with the text inside it:
| Who | Typical use |
|---|---|
| Legal | Search old contracts and court documents scanned from paper |
| Students | Copy text from scanned textbooks, highlight passages, import into notes |
| Accounting | Make scanned invoices and receipts searchable for audit trails |
| Healthcare | Digitize paper patient records while keeping files private — nothing leaves your device |
| Researchers | Make scanned academic papers and archive documents searchable |
| Government / HR | Archive paper forms and convert them to searchable digital records |
PDFree automatically detects which type of PDF you have. Text-layer PDFs (most PDFs created digitally — from Word, Google Docs, or any modern application) already contain machine-readable text embedded in the file — extraction is instant and no OCR engine is needed. Scanned PDFs (photos of pages, fax documents, older archive scans, phone-scanner exports) contain only images and require OCR to convert pixels into selectable, searchable text.
Most OCR tools make you pick the document's language up front, and picking wrong quietly wrecks accuracy. PDFree instead samples the page content and suggests the correct language automatically — a genuinely distinctive feature, since the underlying recognition engine works independently of whichever of PDFree's 6 site languages you're browsing in. Reading a scan in Russian, Japanese, or Turkish while using the English interface? Detection still finds the document's real language. You can always override the suggestion manually if a page mixes scripts or the sample was inconclusive.
PDFree uses Tesseract.js, a leading open-source text recognition engine, and supports 18 languages: English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Uzbek, Dutch, Polish, Turkish (European scripts) and Arabic, Japanese, Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Korean, Hindi, Thai (complex scripts).
After OCR, PDFree shows a quality score (Excellent / Good / Fair / Poor) based on Tesseract's word confidence. The main factors:
The searchable PDF keeps your original scanned images exactly as they were and adds an invisible text layer on top. Open it in any PDF reader and you can select text, use Ctrl+F to search, and copy content — the visual appearance is unchanged. Use this for archiving, sharing, or long-term storage.
The .txt file contains only the extracted plain text with page separators. Use this when you need to edit the content in Word or Google Docs, feed text into another tool, or process it programmatically. Enable "Also download .txt copy" in the options to get both files at once.
Scanned documents often contain sensitive content — contracts, medical records, personal letters, tax forms. With PDFree, nothing is ever uploaded. The OCR engine (Tesseract.js) is downloaded once and then runs entirely inside your browser tab. There are no servers receiving your files, no cloud storage, and no data collection of any kind. Open DevTools → Network tab while processing to verify: zero file uploads.
Once the Tesseract.js engine is downloaded on your first OCR run (~17 MB, cached by your browser), PDFree OCR works completely offline. No internet connection is needed to process subsequent documents. This makes it suitable for environments with restricted network access — legal offices, medical facilities, classified document review, or anywhere you cannot send files to an external server. The service worker caches the application shell, so even the UI loads offline after the first visit.
| Feature | PDFree | Typical online OCR |
|---|---|---|
| File processing | In your browser — local only | File uploaded to a server |
| Language selection | Auto-detected from the document | Manual, easy to pick wrong |
| Account required | No | Often required |
| Output | Searchable PDF + optional .txt | .txt only in many tools |
| Original layout | Preserved exactly | Often reformatted |
| Works offline | Yes, after first load | No |
To convert a scanned PDF to editable text, use PDFree in two steps: first run OCR to create a searchable PDF (above), then open the result in PDF to Word — the tool converts the embedded text layer into a fully editable .docx file. The entire process runs locally; your document is never uploaded anywhere. For plain text output, enable the "Also download .txt copy" checkbox during OCR and skip the Word conversion entirely.
Yes, completely free. No subscription, no premium tier, no per-file charges. The OCR engine (Tesseract.js) is open-source and runs entirely in your browser.
No. PDFree has no backend server that receives your files, so nothing can be stored, logged, or retained. Your PDF and the recognized text exist only in your browser's memory for the session and are cleared when you close the tab.
Never. All processing happens inside your browser tab. Your PDF file never leaves your device — no server ever receives it. The Tesseract.js engine is downloaded from a CDN once and cached; after that it runs fully offline.
PDFree samples text from your scanned pages and suggests the most likely document language before you run OCR — you don't need to know it in advance. This works independently of the site's interface language, so a Spanish-language scan is detected correctly even if you're browsing PDFree in English. You can always override the suggestion from the dropdown.
18 languages: English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Uzbek, Dutch, Polish, Turkish, Arabic, Japanese, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Korean, Hindi, and Thai.
No. PDFree adds an invisible text layer over your original scanned pages. The appearance does not change — images, layout, and formatting stay exactly as they were. You gain the ability to search, select, and copy text in any PDF reader.
OCR accuracy depends on the original scan quality. Low DPI (below 150), blurry or skewed pages, colored backgrounds, and handwritten text all reduce confidence scores. For best results: scan at 300 DPI or higher, good lighting, straight alignment, and let auto-detection pick (or confirm) the correct language.
The searchable PDF keeps your original scanned images and adds an invisible text layer on top — useful for archiving, searching inside a PDF reader, or sharing. The .txt file contains only the extracted plain text with page separators — useful for editing in Word, importing into other tools, or copying content. Download both at once with the "Also download .txt copy" checkbox.
PDFree OCR supports files up to 200 MB. On mobile (iOS/iPadOS), processing is limited to the first 30 pages to prevent memory issues — split the PDF first to process the rest. There are no limits on desktop browsers.
Yes. Once the Tesseract.js engine has been downloaded on your first OCR run, PDFree works fully offline as a Progressive Web App — no internet connection is required to process further documents.