As we are all trying to get back to life as we know it, we are still having to deal with the “new normal.” This means we have to change how we do things, including how we do things here at Heights Libraries. In the past, you may have come into the HKIC and used one of our flatbed scanners to scan a document for work, or a picture of relatives, or slides from long-ago vacations. Unfortunately, this service isn’t available right now.
But I need something scanned now!
If you own a smart phone or a tablet that has a camera built in, then you can scan that document with a simple app. In this post, we take a look at three free apps that are available for both the Android and iOS (Apple) systems. All of these apps are available through the Google Play or the App Store.
Fast Scanner: Free PDF Scan
Fast Scanner turns your device into a multi-page scanner for documents, receipts, notes, invoices, whiteboards, and other paper text. With Fast Scanner, you can quickly scan your documents, then print or email them as multi-page PDF or JPEG files. Moreover, you can save the PDF files in your device or open them in other apps.
Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.coolmobilesolution.fastscannerfree&hl=en_US
App Store:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/fast-scanner-pdf-doc-scan/id586167688
FEATURES:
- Scan documents – scans any type of document, ranging from a receipt to multi-page book into high-quality PDF documents.
- Detect pages- Automatically detects page edges.
- Optimize- Brightness and contrast any image.
- Export to PDF file – All scanned documents are exported as industry-standard PDF file. You can add new pages or delete existed pages within the PDF file.
- Email or print scanned documents – Just scan any documents and tap the “Send” button. If the document needs to be printed, send it to any printer nearby.
- Extremely fast – optimized to run very fast.
- Multi editing support for scanned document – supports many image-editing options so you can make the scanned images as easy to read as possible.
- Printing via Cloud Print or other print apps.
- Universal – a single app that works on phone and tablet too.
- This app has access to:
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- Wi-Fi connection – information view Wi-Fi connections
- Storage – modify or delete the contents of your USB storage, read the contents of your USB storage
- Photos/media/files – modify or delete the contents of your USB storage, read the contents of your USB storage
- Camera – take pictures and videos
- Other – receive data from internet, view network connections, full network access, prevent device from sleeping, run at startup
Tiny Scanner: PDF Scanner App
Tiny Scanner is an app that turns your device into a portable document scanner that can scan everything as images or PDFs and save them to your device.
With Tiny SCanner, you can scan documents, photos, receipts, reports, or just about anything. It is fast and designed for both phone and tablet.
Name and organize your scans into folders, or share them by:
- Wifi directly to your computer
- Dropbox, Evernote, Google Drive, or OneDrive
This document scanner app has multiple useful features:
- Scan in color, grayscale, or black and white
- Can be used in office, school, home, and anywhere else you want
- Page edges are detected automatically
- 5 levels of contrast for crisp monochrome texts
- Set page sizes for PDF (letter, legal, A4, and more)
- Thumbnail or list view can sort scans by date or title
- Optimized to run very fast.
- Quick search by document title
- Protect your documents with a passcode
- Universal – a single app that works on phone and tablet too!
The free version is an ad-supported version, which means you have to deal with pop-up ads, and it has some restricted functions, which means some functions are not available in the free version. They also offer an ad-free version that is available as an in-app purchase or the individual pro version.
Google Play:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appxy.tinyscanner&hl=en_US
App Store:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/scanner-app-scan-pdf-document/id595563753
This app has access to:
- Photos/media/files – read the contents of your USB storage, modify or delete the contents of your USB storage
- Storage – read the contents of your USB storage, modify or delete the contents of your USB storage
- Camera – take pictures and videos
- Wi-Fi connection – information, view Wi-Fi connections
- Other – receive data from internet, view network connections, control flashlight, full network access, prevent device from sleeping
Tap Scanner: Scanner App To PDF
Tap Scanner is a simple camera document scanner app with high-quality PDF output.
Top features include:
- Scan documents, receipts, QR codes, and business cards.
- Automatically detects borders.
- Fine tunes the image with many filters.
- Easily manages your documents.
- Exports your document scan to PDF or PNG formats
- Enables output of live text from scanner with built-in OCR with over 110 languages
- Sign and send documents to others for signing with an electronic signature.
- Cloud integration – Lets you upload your scanned documents to your favorite cloud service: Google Drive, Dropbox and more.
- Simplify document scanning and signing by adding custom fields to documents.
- Scan QR codes, and convert them to email, text and links seamlessly.
Tap Scanner has some in-app features that are not free and have a fee associated with them.
Google Play:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=pdf.tap.scanner&hl=en_US
App Store:
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/camera-scanner-pdf-tapscanner/id1382564905
We hope this helps you with your scanning needs.