Not every document starts in Word. Typst has become a quick way to write papers, letters, CVs and lecture notes without wrestling with LaTeX, and many teams keep their manuals, specs and runbooks in AsciiDoc. Then someone asks for a signed, scanned copy, and the source file is all you have on the computer in front of you.

Look Scanned now opens both. Use Typst to Scanned PDF for .typ files and AsciiDoc to Scanned PDF for .adoc and .asciidoc files. The document is turned into pages inside your browser. You check them in the preview, add the scan effect, and download a PDF that looks like it went through a real scanner. There is no Typst CLI to install, no Ruby or Asciidoctor PDF, and no account to sign in to.

Typst: the real compiler, in your browser

Look Scanned runs the official Typst compiler (Typst 0.14), built for the browser. It is the same compiler behind typst compile, so pages, line breaks, equations and tables come out as they would on your own machine, including the page size and margins your document sets.

  • The first file takes a moment. The compiler and Typst's fonts, about 20 MB together, download from Look Scanned the first time. After that they come from your browser's cache, and Typst files open even offline.
  • One file, no packages. Only self-contained documents compile. An #import "@preview/…" line fails, because there is no package registry to download from. So does anything that reads another file: a picture placed with #image, a chapter pulled in with #include, or data loaded from a CSV or JSON file.
  • Typst's default fonts only. Text is set in the fonts Typst ships with: Libertinus Serif, New Computer Modern with its math font, and DejaVu Sans Mono for code. Fonts installed on your computer are not available, so a font your document names falls back to these. They cover Latin (including Vietnamese), Greek, Cyrillic and Hebrew. Chinese, Japanese and Korean text has no font to fall back on, and scripts such as Arabic, Thai or Devanagari aren't properly supported either, so check the preview if your document uses them.
  • The source has to compile. If Typst reports an error, you get an error instead of pages.

Because Typst writes a real PDF before the scan effect goes on, its text can come along. When you save a PDF, turn on "Preserve original text (OCR-like)" in Output Settings, and the scanned PDF stays searchable and its text can be copied.

AsciiDoc: Asciidoctor without Ruby

AsciiDoc files are converted by Asciidoctor, the reference AsciiDoc processor, in its JavaScript build that runs in your browser. The result is laid out on A4 pages with one-inch margins, and this is what comes through:

  • The document header: title, author and revision line, plus the table of contents when the document sets :toc:.
  • Sections, lists, tables, footnotes, quotes and code callouts. Admonitions print their label, such as Note or Warning, as text rather than as an icon.
  • STEM math, typeset in a proper math font when the document sets :stem:. Both AsciiMath and LaTeX notation work, inline and in blocks.
  • Code listings coloured by syntax when the document sets :source-highlighter:, whichever highlighter it names. Without that attribute, listings stay plain, as they would anywhere else.
  • Long tables and listings continue on the next page, and a table row is never cut in half.

A few things don't come through:

  • include:: is not followed. Each include directive is shown as a link to its path instead of the included content. Merge the parts into one file first.
  • Images need a full web address. An image referenced by a relative path such as images/diagram.png can't be found, because the file is opened on its own, without its folder. An image with a full https:// address is loaded from the site that hosts it, which needs an internet connection.
  • Diagrams stay as source. Asciidoctor Diagram is not available, so a PlantUML or Mermaid block appears as the text you typed.
  • Fonts come from your device. The text is set in the fonts installed on your computer or phone, so the same file can break pages differently on another machine.
  • Very long files can run out of time. Layout has to finish within about 30 seconds, so split a book-length document into smaller files.
  • .asc files are not accepted. That extension usually belongs to PGP keys and signatures. Rename an AsciiDoc file to .adoc before you open it.

How to turn a .typ or .adoc file into a scanned PDF

  1. Open Typst to Scanned PDF or AsciiDoc to Scanned PDF and select your file.
  2. Wait a moment while the pages are prepared, then go through the preview page by page. Check the headings, the equations, the tables and the code.
  3. Adjust the scan effect. Keep blur and noise low if the document has small print or dense math.
  4. Click "Generate Scanned PDF", then "Download Scanned PDF".

If you'd rather have images, you can export each page as JPG or PNG instead. Our guide to PDF, JPG and PNG explains when each one makes sense. With Pro, Bulk Scan handles several .typ or .adoc files at once.

Your file stays on your device

Both formats are converted and scanned in your browser, and the source file is never uploaded to a server. For Typst, the only downloads are the compiler and its fonts, from Look Scanned's own site; packages and other files are never fetched. For AsciiDoc, the one exception is an image with a full https:// address, which is fetched from the site that hosts it, just as it would be if you opened the page in a browser.

Good to know

  • The output is made of images. Like a real scan, the text in the PDF can't be selected or searched, unless you used the text option above for a Typst file. Keep your .typ or .adoc source for editing.
  • There is always a scan effect. Look Scanned makes documents look scanned. If you only need a clean PDF, export it with Typst or Asciidoctor PDF instead.
  • Need packages, includes or diagrams? Build the PDF on a machine that has Typst or Asciidoctor PDF installed, then add the scan effect to that PDF in Look Scanned. That works for any document, because the original tool has already done the hard part.

Writing in something else? See how Look Scanned handles LaTeX files and Markdown, HTML and TXT files.

Got a .typ or .adoc file that needs to look scanned? Try Typst or try AsciiDoc.