You want a PDF with a scanned appearance, but the recipient still needs to find an invoice number or copy a paragraph. Saving every page as an image can get in the way.
In Look Scanned, Preserve original text (OCR-like) keeps existing source text alongside the scanned page image. The exported PDF can still be searched and its text copied. This option is off by default; turn it on when you need both the scanned look and the text.
How to keep text in your scanned PDF
- Open Look Scanned and select your file.
- Adjust the scan effect and check the preview.
- In Output Settings, choose PDF as the Output Format.
- Turn on Preserve original text (OCR-like).
- Generate and download the PDF, then open the saved file in your PDF reader.
Use the reader's search command—usually Ctrl+F on Windows or Command+F on Mac—to find a word you know is there. Try selecting a sentence and pasting it into a text editor too. This checks the downloaded file, not just its appearance in the preview.
In standard scanning, processing happens in your browser without sending the source document to a processing server.
Which files can keep their text?
Text preservation is available for these source formats when the output is PDF:
| Source | What can be kept |
|---|---|
| Text already present in the pages, including an existing OCR text layer | |
| Word (.docx) | Text from the document |
| PowerPoint (.pptx) | Text from the slides |
| Typst (.typ) | Text from the PDF generated by the Typst compiler |
| CAJ | Existing text from supported pages; pages stored as images have none to keep |
An available switch does not mean every page contains text. A PDF made only of photographs can open normally and still have nothing to preserve. Words inside pictures, screenshots or scanned page images are not recognized.
If your source format does not support this option, export it to a PDF with selectable text from the original application first, then process that PDF in Look Scanned. Saving a picture as a PDF alone does not give it a text layer.
Is this OCR?
OCR—optical character recognition—reads text from an image. Adobe's explanation of OCR describes how it creates selectable, searchable text from scanned pages.
Look Scanned keeps text that is already in the source. It does not read letters from pixels or correct errors in an existing OCR layer. The label says “OCR-like” because the result can be searched and copied, not because the tool performs recognition.
If you start with a photo or an image-only PDF and need searchable text, use an OCR tool first. Then check the recognized text before applying the scanned effect.
If search or copy does not work
- The switch is disabled: select your own PDF, DOCX, PPTX, Typst or CAJ file. The built-in example and unsupported formats do not enable it.
- The switch is missing: check that the output is PDF. PNG and JPEG exports are images and cannot carry this text layer.
- Some pages are searchable, others are not: the source may mix text pages and image-only pages. There is no recognition step to fill the gaps.
- A warning says text could not be preserved: the PDF was saved, but some text could not be extracted, or no text was found. Open the result and check it before sharing.
- Copied text has unexpected spacing or order: compare it with the original. Text layout and extraction vary between files and PDF readers; keep the source if exact reuse matters.
What to check before sharing
Covered text is kept too. A black rectangle, stamp or watermark over a sentence does not remove its underlying text when this option is on. For confidential material, properly redact the source first. Turning this switch off is not a substitute for a redaction workflow.
Searchable text also does not restore clickable links or editable forms, or guarantee an accessible PDF. For an accessible handoff, retain the properly structured original; see scanned PDF vs editable PDF.