Make a scanned PDF searchable

1 min read·23 July 2026

A scanned PDF is essentially an image — you cannot select or search the text. With OCR (optical character recognition) you convert the scan into a searchable PDF. PDFrust does this locally in your browser.

What is OCR?

OCR stands for Optical Character Recognition: software that recognises text in an image. Once OCR is applied to a scanned PDF, you can select, search and copy text as if it were a normal PDF document.

How do you use the OCR tool?

Drag your scanned PDF to the OCR page. Choose the language of the text (Dutch, English, German, French or Spanish) and start recognition. The tool processes each page and delivers a new PDF with a text layer on top.

PDF OCR — scan to text

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How accurate is the recognition?

Accuracy depends on scan quality. A clear, straight scan gives excellent results. A skewed, blurry or low-resolution scan gives more errors. For professional archiving, a scan of at least 300 dpi is recommended.

Which languages are supported?

PDFrust supports OCR in five languages: Dutch, English, German, French and Spanish. Choose the language that best matches the text in your document for the best results.