Image to Text Converter (OCR)

Video Guide: Image to Text Converter (OCR)

Video guide with full transcript

About Image to Text Converter (OCR)

Extract text from clear, simple screenshots in your browser. Best for typed text with a plain background. Your images stay on your device. Review the text for errors.

At a Glance

• Best for: clear screenshots and photos of printed, typed text on a plain background.
• Languages: over 30, including English, Spanish, French, German, Russian, Arabic, Hindi, Korean, Chinese and Japanese. Chinese, Japanese and English can be mixed in one image.
• Images: PNG, JPG, GIF, BMP, WebP and TIFF, by drag and drop, the file picker, or pasting from the clipboard.
• Result: editable text you can copy or download as a file. Brightness and contrast controls help clean up a faint image first.
• Privacy: the text is read on your own device and the image is never uploaded.
• Not suited to: handwriting, blurry photos or complex tables. For handwriting, use the AI Handwriting to Text tool.

What is OCR (Optical Character Recognition)?

Optical Character Recognition (OCR) is a technology that converts different types of documents — scanned paper documents, PDF files, or images captured by a digital camera — into editable and searchable text. OCR technology analyzes the shapes of characters in an image and matches them against known patterns to identify letters, numbers, and symbols.

Key Features

• Two Open-Source Engines, Both in Your Browser: The default is PP-OCRv6, released in 2026, which reads Chinese, Japanese and English far more accurately than older engines. You can switch to Tesseract.js for a smaller download. Your images are never uploaded to any server.
• 30+ Languages: PP-OCRv6 reads Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Japanese, English and most European languages — including mixed Chinese, Japanese and English in one image. Korean, Russian, Arabic, Thai, Vietnamese and other scripts are read with Tesseract.js.
• Progress You Can See: Every line of text found is outlined on the preview and turns green once it is read. The text fills in as recognition goes, with an estimate of the time left.
• Multiple Upload Methods: Drag and drop images, click to browse, or paste directly from your clipboard (Ctrl+V / Cmd+V).
• Image Preprocessing: Adjust brightness and contrast to improve recognition accuracy for low-quality or faded images.
• Confidence Score: See how confident the OCR engine is about the extracted text, helping you identify areas that may need manual review.
• Copy and Download: One-click copy to clipboard or download extracted text as a file.

How to Use This OCR Tool

1. Upload your image: Drag and drop an image onto the upload area, click to browse files, or paste an image from your clipboard using Ctrl+V (Cmd+V on Mac).
2. Select the language: Choose the language of the text in your image from the dropdown menu. Selecting the correct language significantly improves recognition accuracy.
3. Adjust image settings (optional): Click "Image Preprocessing" to access brightness and contrast controls. This is especially useful for low-quality, faded, or poorly lit images.
4. Click Extract Text: Press the "Extract Text" button to start. The progress panel walks through four steps — downloading the model, starting the engine, finding the text, and reading it line by line. On your first visit, the model starts downloading in the background as soon as you choose an image.
5. Review and use the results: The extracted text appears in an editable text area. You can edit it directly, copy to clipboard, or download as a text file.

Tips for Better OCR Results

Image Quality

Higher resolution images produce better results. Aim for at least 300 DPI when scanning documents. Avoid blurry, skewed, or heavily compressed images.

Contrast and Lighting

Good contrast between text and background is essential. Use the built-in preprocessing controls to enhance faded or low-contrast images. Dark text on a white background works best.

Language Selection

For Chinese, Japanese, English and most European languages, leave the language on "Auto-detect" — PP-OCRv6 reads all of them with one model, even when they are mixed. For Korean, Russian, Thai, Arabic or Vietnamese text, choose that language in the menu, and the tool switches to the matching Tesseract.js model.

Text Orientation

PP-OCRv6 copes with slightly tilted photos and also reads vertical text (right to left). If the whole image is rotated 90 degrees or upside down, rotate it upright before extracting.

Supported Image Formats

• PNG — Best for screenshots and text-heavy images (lossless compression)
• JPEG/JPG — Common photo format, good for scanned documents
• WebP — Modern format with good quality-to-size ratio
• BMP — Uncompressed bitmap images
• GIF — Supports simple images (first frame used for animated GIFs)
• TIFF — Professional scanning format (browser support varies)

Common Use Cases

Extracting Text from Screenshots

Quickly grab text from screenshots of websites, error messages, chat conversations, or social media posts. Simply paste the screenshot (Ctrl+V) and extract the text.

Privacy and Security

Both recognition engines run entirely in your web browser. Your images are never uploaded to any server, and nothing is stored or shared — the only thing downloaded is the recognition model itself. That makes the tool safe for documents with personal or confidential information.

Tesseract vs. PP-OCRv6 vs. AI: Which Image-to-Text Method to Use

This page gives you two open-source engines that run in your browser; for handwriting or translation, an AI tool does the job better. The error rates in the first two columns come from our own test set of 14 images (Chinese, Japanese and English paragraphs, a receipt photo, a street sign photo, an app screenshot and vertical text) — lower is better. The AI column describes what each tool is suited for; it was not part of the test.

Which one should you use?

• Everyday screenshots, documents and photos: keep the default, PP-OCRv6.
• Limited mobile data or an older device: choose Tesseract.js under "OCR Engine". The download is much smaller, and it still reads clean printed screenshots well.
• Handwritten notes, letters or forms: use the AI Handwriting to Text Converter.
• Text in a language you don't read: use the Image Translator. It reads and translates in one step, puts the translation back where the original text was, keeps the layout, and lets you download the translated image.

Error rates are from our test images; your results will vary with image quality, fonts and layout. In "Auto-detect" mode, Tesseract.js tries English first and then other languages, so a non-English image is read more reliably if you choose its language.

About the Recognition Engines

PP-OCRv6 is an open-source OCR model released in June 2026 by the PaddlePaddle team at Baidu, under the Apache 2.0 license. This tool uses its Small version: a detection model first finds where each line of text is, then a recognition model reads the lines one by one. A single model reads Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Japanese, English and most European languages. It runs in your browser through ONNX Runtime Web and uses GPU acceleration automatically when your browser supports WebGPU.

Tesseract.js is the JavaScript version of Tesseract, the long-standing open-source OCR engine. It has a separate, smaller model for each language, so the download is light, and it works well on clean printed screenshots. This tool uses it for the languages PP-OCRv6 does not cover, such as Korean, Russian, Thai, Arabic and Vietnamese.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is my image data safe when using this OCR tool?

Yes. Both of this tool's recognition engines, PP-OCRv6 and Tesseract.js, run in your browser, and your images are never uploaded to any server. The only thing downloaded is the recognition model; all text extraction happens on your device.

What languages does this OCR tool support?

The language menu lists over 30 languages. Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Japanese, English, and 17 Latin-script languages such as Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Italian and Polish are read by PP-OCRv6, which also handles Chinese, Japanese and English mixed in one image. Korean, Russian, Arabic, Hindi, Thai, Vietnamese and the other languages are read with Tesseract.js automatically.

What image formats are supported?

The tool supports all common image formats including PNG, JPEG, JPG, GIF, BMP, WebP, and TIFF. You can upload images by dragging and dropping, clicking the upload area, or pasting from your clipboard.

How can I improve OCR accuracy?

To improve OCR accuracy: use high-resolution images, ensure good contrast between text and background, select the correct language, use the built-in brightness and contrast controls to preprocess the image, and ensure the image is not rotated or skewed. Best for clear screenshots with simple, typed text. Handwriting, blurry photos, tables and complex layouts may produce poor results. Check the extracted text against the image.

Does this OCR tool work on mobile devices?

Yes, this OCR tool is fully responsive and works on mobile phones and tablets. You can take a photo directly with your camera and upload it, or paste screenshots. The interface adapts to smaller screens for a smooth mobile experience.

How long does OCR processing take?

When your browser supports GPU acceleration (WebGPU, as in recent Chrome and Edge), PP-OCRv6 usually takes under 1.5 seconds per image. On CPU only it takes about 1 to 9 seconds, depending on how much text there is. The first run also downloads about 35 MB of models and spends a few seconds preparing GPU acceleration; after that it is much faster. While it works, the progress panel shows the current step and the estimated time left, and you can cancel at any time.

Why does the first run download a model? Will it download every time?

Text recognition happens on your device, so your browser first needs the recognition model: about 35 MB for PP-OCRv6, or 3 to 5 MB for Tesseract.js. Once downloaded, the model is saved in your browser and loaded from there next time. If your browser's Data Saver mode is on, the tool starts with the smaller Tesseract.js instead.

Can it read handwriting, or translate the text in an image?

Both open-source engines are built for printed text. For handwriting, use the AI Handwriting to Text Converter. To translate the text in a picture into English or another language, use the Image Translator: it puts the translation back into the image and keeps the original layout. These two AI tools upload your image to our server for processing and use 1 AI credit per image.

Prefer One Click? Get the Chrome Extension

If you extract text from images often, our Copy Text from Image Chrome extension puts this tool one click away. Right-click any image on any website and choose "Copy text from this image" — the recognized text is copied to your clipboard after processing. Or press Alt+Shift+T and drag a box over any part of your screen: a video frame, a PDF page, text a website will not let you select. Recognition runs entirely on your device with the privacy-first Tesseract engine, and it works offline once installed. The core features are free every day; Pro is a single one-time payment — no subscription. Add it to Chrome for free, or learn more about the extension.

Additional Resources

• Optical Character Recognition - Wikipedia
• PaddleOCR (PP-OCRv6) - GitHub Repository
• Tesseract.js - GitHub Repository
• Tesseract OCR Official Site

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