# Make a scan searchable

Read the words in a scanned PDF so you can search and copy them. Run OCR on a scanned PDF in English, Hindi, Bengali or Urdu. Free to use. No sign-up. Your files never leave your device.

Use it here: https://pannapdf.app/make-searchable/

This is free OCR for PDFs. Read the words in a scanned PDF so they can be searched and copied, in English, Hindi, Bengali and Urdu. The reading happens on your own device; your pages are not sent anywhere.

Also known as: OCR PDF, searchable PDF, Hindi OCR, Bengali OCR, Urdu OCR, scanned PDF to text, image to text, make PDF searchable, PDF OCR online.

## How it works

1. Choose the scanned PDF.
2. Tick the language of the writing: English, Hindi, Bengali or Urdu.
3. Press "Read the words". You get the same PDF with words you can search and copy, or just the words as a text file.

## Questions people ask

### How long does it take?

A few seconds for each page. The first time, it also has to fetch the reading engine, which is about 15 MB.

### Does it read handwriting?

Not well. It is made for printed writing. Faint or crooked scans also read poorly.

## About Panna

Every tool runs inside the visitor's own browser. Files are never uploaded; they do not leave the phone or computer. There is no sign-up and no charge, and the site adds no watermark of its own to the files. The site can be shown in 19 languages: English, Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Telugu, Tamil, Gujarati, Urdu, Kannada, Odia, Malayalam, Punjabi, Assamese, Maithili, Nepali, Sindhi, Konkani, Dogri, Sanskrit.

All tools: https://pannapdf.app/sitemap.md