While until a few years ago that of recognizing text in an image seemed a complex operation, today it is also possible to do it with a free phone app.
In practical terms, it is possible to recognize and extract the text from a photo, for example the photo of a book or document, in order to make that text editable and correctly formatted on an editor such as Word.
Every time, therefore, it becomes necessary to extract text written on a sheet of paper or a sign, just photograph it and then, using the right application, extract it using OCR technology, that is, that of optical character recognition.
Here we see the best and free OCR Apps to use for recognizing text from images and photos .
Although some of these apps are also available for iPhone and iPad, the selection was made based on the tests made on Android smartphones (including Samsung Galaxy, Huawei, LG, HTC etc.).
READ ALSO: OCR Convert scanned sheets and PDFs into editable texts
1) Google Keep
The excellent Google Keep notes and notes application includes OCR technology to recognize text and characters in photos.
Keep is able to keep the formatting of the text as photographed and as present in the image, even if complex.
On how to transcribe text of photos with Keep we have already written a guide that we are going to summarize: touch the + how to add a new note, choose to add it via photo and then photograph the sheet of paper or select an image from the phone gallery .
The text is extracted in seconds and made available for editing.
Compared to other apps, Keep has the advantage of being Google and, therefore, of integrating with Google Drive and of synchronizing the notes on the Google account so that they are available from every computer and mobile phone (also iPhone and iPad).
2) Text Fairy
Text Fairy is a free app for Android released in 2017 that works really well to extract text from images and recognize words written in more than 50 languages, including Chinese, Japanese, Dutch, French, English and, of course, Italian .
The app works very well especially to scan books and magazines with a simple layout, also because it shows some difficulty in recognizing colored words.
To use Text Fairy you have to touch the camera icon to take a photo or the gallery icon to import an image.
You then have to adjust the section of the image to be scanned, indicate whether the text is in one or two columns and choose the language.
The extracted text can be edited or copied on an editor such as that of the App Office for Android.
3) Office Lens
This application, to which I had already dedicated an article, is one of the best that Microsoft has ever released for Android (and also for iPhone).
Although its main feature is the ability to scan and digitize documents, the app also comes with an OCR option that can be used for free if you connect a Microsoft account.
Office Lens is certainly one of the best applications when it comes to recognizing text from an image, without any problem in identifying even colored characters.
In addition, it is also the best OCR application for Android OCR in recognizing handwritten text.
Of course it integrates tightly with other Microsoft products like OneNote and Office 365.
To use this application, after installing and opening it, you must point the camera at the document you want to acquire, take the photo, save it and then open the recognized text with Word.
4) Text Scanner [OCR]
This less popular and generic name application is surprisingly good for saving text taken from photographs.
Text Scanner supports over 50 languages, including Chinese, Japanese, French and Italian.
It also supports the extraction of handwritten text (although not perfectly) and has tools for enlarging and changing the brightness for better text capture.
To use it, after opening it, take and scan the paper document or import an image from the gallery to be able to immediately see the recognized text that can be copied wherever you want.
5) OCR Text Scanner
This is also an app not very famous, but that works well in recognizing words written in almost all languages, including English, German, Italian and others.
The app is simple and automatic, it works particularly well for documents, while it doesn't go into handwritten notes.
The main flaw, however, is the advertising that often appears.
6) CamScanner
This app, available in free and paid versions, is an excellent alternative to other OCR apps for Android, to recognize text on photos and various images.
Its best feature is that it is capable of processing multiple documents in one go.
It is also one of the best document scanner apps.
7) Smart OCR is a very fast OCR text recognition app, which instantly recognizes words in images so you can copy and extract them as text.
In closing, I would like to keep in mind that despite technological advances, no OCR tool is 100 percent reliable in recognizing text written on a sheet.
The results depend very much on the language, the brightness, the quality of the sheet scanned and also the camera used.
It is always advisable to verify the correctness of the recognition and to make a comparison with the scanned original document.
Google Keep seems the most convenient of the apps to digitize printed documents, while Office Lens works better than others in digitizing handwritten notes.
READ ALSO: Programs to capture text from images on PC
In practical terms, it is possible to recognize and extract the text from a photo, for example the photo of a book or document, in order to make that text editable and correctly formatted on an editor such as Word.
Every time, therefore, it becomes necessary to extract text written on a sheet of paper or a sign, just photograph it and then, using the right application, extract it using OCR technology, that is, that of optical character recognition.
Here we see the best and free OCR Apps to use for recognizing text from images and photos .
Although some of these apps are also available for iPhone and iPad, the selection was made based on the tests made on Android smartphones (including Samsung Galaxy, Huawei, LG, HTC etc.).
READ ALSO: OCR Convert scanned sheets and PDFs into editable texts
1) Google Keep
The excellent Google Keep notes and notes application includes OCR technology to recognize text and characters in photos.
Keep is able to keep the formatting of the text as photographed and as present in the image, even if complex.
On how to transcribe text of photos with Keep we have already written a guide that we are going to summarize: touch the + how to add a new note, choose to add it via photo and then photograph the sheet of paper or select an image from the phone gallery .
The text is extracted in seconds and made available for editing.
Compared to other apps, Keep has the advantage of being Google and, therefore, of integrating with Google Drive and of synchronizing the notes on the Google account so that they are available from every computer and mobile phone (also iPhone and iPad).
2) Text Fairy
Text Fairy is a free app for Android released in 2017 that works really well to extract text from images and recognize words written in more than 50 languages, including Chinese, Japanese, Dutch, French, English and, of course, Italian .
The app works very well especially to scan books and magazines with a simple layout, also because it shows some difficulty in recognizing colored words.
To use Text Fairy you have to touch the camera icon to take a photo or the gallery icon to import an image.
You then have to adjust the section of the image to be scanned, indicate whether the text is in one or two columns and choose the language.
The extracted text can be edited or copied on an editor such as that of the App Office for Android.
3) Office Lens
This application, to which I had already dedicated an article, is one of the best that Microsoft has ever released for Android (and also for iPhone).
Although its main feature is the ability to scan and digitize documents, the app also comes with an OCR option that can be used for free if you connect a Microsoft account.
Office Lens is certainly one of the best applications when it comes to recognizing text from an image, without any problem in identifying even colored characters.
In addition, it is also the best OCR application for Android OCR in recognizing handwritten text.
Of course it integrates tightly with other Microsoft products like OneNote and Office 365.
To use this application, after installing and opening it, you must point the camera at the document you want to acquire, take the photo, save it and then open the recognized text with Word.
4) Text Scanner [OCR]
This less popular and generic name application is surprisingly good for saving text taken from photographs.
Text Scanner supports over 50 languages, including Chinese, Japanese, French and Italian.
It also supports the extraction of handwritten text (although not perfectly) and has tools for enlarging and changing the brightness for better text capture.
To use it, after opening it, take and scan the paper document or import an image from the gallery to be able to immediately see the recognized text that can be copied wherever you want.
5) OCR Text Scanner
This is also an app not very famous, but that works well in recognizing words written in almost all languages, including English, German, Italian and others.
The app is simple and automatic, it works particularly well for documents, while it doesn't go into handwritten notes.
The main flaw, however, is the advertising that often appears.
6) CamScanner
This app, available in free and paid versions, is an excellent alternative to other OCR apps for Android, to recognize text on photos and various images.
Its best feature is that it is capable of processing multiple documents in one go.
It is also one of the best document scanner apps.
7) Smart OCR is a very fast OCR text recognition app, which instantly recognizes words in images so you can copy and extract them as text.
In closing, I would like to keep in mind that despite technological advances, no OCR tool is 100 percent reliable in recognizing text written on a sheet.
The results depend very much on the language, the brightness, the quality of the sheet scanned and also the camera used.
It is always advisable to verify the correctness of the recognition and to make a comparison with the scanned original document.
Google Keep seems the most convenient of the apps to digitize printed documents, while Office Lens works better than others in digitizing handwritten notes.
READ ALSO: Programs to capture text from images on PC
