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Edit a scanned PDF

Upload a scan, run OCR in your document's language, and keep working in the editor with text you can select, correct and add to.

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or paste with Ctrl/⌘+V

Runs on our servers. 5 free OCR pages without an account, 20 a month on the free plan.

PDF · JPG · PNG · TIFF · up to 25 MB

Try it 5× without an account. A free account includes 20 OCR pages a month. See plans

What it does

Edit scanned PDF, explained

Edit scanned PDF turns a page that is only a picture into something you can work on: OCR recognizes the text first, then the document opens in the editor so you can fix a misread word, change a date, fill blanks or add notes.

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This is the right page when the scan itself needs changing, such as a signed lease that needs a corrected unit number on a copy, an old form you want to re-use, or a faxed letter you need to annotate. If you only need to search and copy text, OCR PDF is enough. If the scan is crooked or faint, run Restore scanned PDF first; recognition is better on a clean page.

Be clear about what editing a scan means. The page is still an image. When you change a recognized line, the original pixels are covered and your new text is placed on top in a standard font picked to resemble it. On clean white paper that is hard to spot; on yellowed or textured paper the patch can show.

Covering scanned text is visual. The old words are still in the image underneath, so anyone with an editor could remove your overlay. If the old content must be gone, use Redact PDF instead.

How to do it

Edit a scanned PDF in 5 steps

  1. 1A scan: only pixels

  2. 2Recognize the text

  3. 3Text you can search and select

  1. 1

    Upload the scan

    PDF, JPG, PNG and TIFF are accepted. Images are placed on PDF pages before recognition.

  2. 2

    Pick the language

    Choose the language or languages printed on the page. A wrong language setting is the most common cause of misread accents and characters.

  3. 3

    Run OCR

    Each recognized page counts toward your OCR page allowance. The page image is not changed.

  4. 4

    Edit in the editor

    The document opens with Edit text selected. Click a recognized line to change it, or use Text, Date and Checkmark tools to add to the page.

  5. 5

    Download

    Downloading needs a free account; the Free plan includes 3 edited-document downloads a month.

Example

Before and after

Before

A two-page signed services agreement scanned on an office copier, where the start date reads “June 3” and the parties agreed in writing to change it to “June 10” on a working copy.

After

After OCR the date line is selectable. The working copy shows “June 10” in a matching serif font over a white patch, with the rest of the scan untouched, ready to annotate and send back.

Settings & formats

What you can control

Recognition language
One or more languages; pick every language that appears on the page.
Editor tools
Edit text on recognized lines, add text, erase, highlight, sign and fill, as in any PDF.

Input

PDFJPGPNGTIFF

Output

PDF

Good to know before you start

  • Replacement text is drawn over the scan image; it does not alter the pixels underneath, and the patch can be visible on tinted or textured paper.
  • Recognition quality depends on the scan: low resolution, skew, handwriting and stamps lead to misread words that you need to correct.
  • Fonts in a scan can't be identified exactly; replacements use the closest available standard font.
  • Without an account you can run OCR on 5 pages and edit, but downloading the edited file needs an account.
If something goes wrong
The recognized text is full of errors
Check the language setting first. Then try Restore scanned PDF to straighten and clean the page, and run OCR again. For handwriting and dense tables, AI OCR corrects what standard OCR misses.
My replacement text doesn't line up
Drag the edited line into place and adjust the font size. Scans are often slightly rotated; straightening the page with Restore scanned PDF before OCR helps.
A grey box shows where I edited
The cover color defaults to white. Change it to the color of the paper so the patch blends into the scan.

Edit scanned PDF: questions people ask

Is this the same as OCR PDF?

OCR is the first step of this workflow. OCR PDF stops after adding a searchable text layer; Edit scanned PDF continues into the editor so you can change and add content.

Can I edit handwriting in a scan?

Standard OCR recognizes printed text well and handwriting poorly. You can still cover handwriting and type over it, but for recognizing it, AI OCR does a better job.

Are my edits permanent in the scan?

They are placed on top of the page image. If you need text truly removed, for example an account number, use Redact PDF, which burns the box into the page and deletes what was underneath.

Can I turn the scan into a Word document instead?

Yes. Run OCR, then use PDF to Word. Expect to tidy the layout, because a scan has no paragraphs or styles to reconstruct from.

Does OCR change how the page looks?

No. Recognition adds an invisible text layer and leaves the image untouched. Only the edits you make afterwards change what you see.

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