Scan to PDF
Photograph the pages, check them, put them in order, get one PDF. No app to install, no pairing with a computer, and nothing leaves your phone.
Why this does not need an app
The usual arrangement for scanning on a phone is either an app that wants an account, or a desktop tool that shows you a QR code, pairs your phone to a session, and relays the photographs through a server so they can appear on your computer.
That relay is the only reason the pairing exists. If you open this page on the phone, the phone already has the camera, the photographs and the processor needed to assemble a PDF — so nothing has to travel. The result is a file you can share however you normally would.
Getting a readable scan
- Fill the frame with the page. Everything else in shot is wasted detail and wasted bytes.
- Keep the phone parallel to the page. A skewed photograph is harder to read and much harder to OCR.
- Use even light, not flash. Flash gives a bright hotspot and hard shadows; daylight or a room light is better.
- Put the page on a dark surface. It makes the edges obvious, which helps if you crop afterwards.
- Check each shot before you move on. Discarding a blurred page here costs a second; discovering it after submission costs rather more.
A sensible sequence
- Scan the pages here.
- Crop away the desk and the shadows.
- OCR if you need to search the text later.
- Compress last, to whatever limit you have been given.
Common questions
Do I need to pair my phone with my computer?
No, and that is the point. Other scan-to-PDF tools pair a phone to a desktop session and pass the photographs through their servers to get them across. Open this page on the phone itself and the photographs never go anywhere — the phone is where the document already is.
Is the camera stream recorded?
No. The live view is shown so you can line the page up, and only the frames you actually capture are kept — in memory, until you close the tab. Nothing is written to disk or sent anywhere, and the camera is released when you press Stop or leave the page.
The camera will not open.
A page can only use the camera over HTTPS and with your permission. If you refused it, or the browser blocks it, use "Choose photos" instead — on a phone that opens the camera anyway and works just as well.
Why is the PDF so large?
Because photographs are large: a few phone shots easily come to several megabytes. Lower the quality setting, or send the result through the compressor, which is what the rest of this site is for.
Match the photo or use A4?
Match the photo if it is going to be read on a screen — nothing is cropped and no space is wasted. Choose A4 if it will be printed or a form expects standard pages; the photo is centred and its proportions are kept.
Can I get searchable text out of it?
Yes, afterwards. Build the PDF here, then run it through OCR, which adds a text layer without changing how the pages look.