Free · No sign-up required

Copy text from a screenshot

Turn the words in a screenshot into text you can edit. Upload or paste your image, click Extract Text, then review, copy or download the result.

Windows: Ctrl+V · Mac: Cmd+V where image paste is supported.
On iPhone or Android, tap Choose files and select a saved screenshot.

Drag & drop your images here — or click to upload

JPG · PNG · PDF · WEBP · GIF · 10 MB per file · Paste with Ctrl+V or Cmd+V

Google Cloud Vision processing · Guest text not saved · Signed-in history

Choose files

100 free extraction units per day for guests and free signed-in users. One unit per image or PDF page.

100 free extraction units per day for guests and free signed-in users. Each image or PDF page counts as one unit. Resets at midnight UTC.

JPEG, PNG, WEBP, GIF and PDF · 10 MB per file · Up to 10 PDF pages per upload.

Processed by Google Cloud Vision. Guest text is not saved to history; signed-in extractions are saved to your account. How your data is handled.

From a screenshot to a useful note

This synthetic study-group screenshot contains no personal information. The text beside it is illustrative, not a measured OCR result. Your result remains editable so you can fix a missed character before copying.

Sample screenshot: Study group, Thursday at 4:30 PM, Room B12. Bring your notes on chapter 3.
Synthetic screenshot · Download to try in the tool

Illustrative plain-text example

Study group
Thursday, 4:30 PM
Room B12
Bring your notes on chapter 3.

How to use screenshots on your device

Windows

Use Windows+Shift+S to capture a region. Return here and press Ctrl+V, or save the capture and upload it. Click Extract Text after the preview appears. Some versions of Snipping Tool also offer built-in Text actions; those work separately from this website.

Mac

Use Shift+Command+4 to save a selected area, then upload the saved image. Add Control to that shortcut to copy the capture to the clipboard, then try Cmd+V here. Click Extract Text. On supported Macs, Live Text in Preview is a separate built-in option.

iPhone

Take a screenshot using your model’s buttons and save it to Photos. Open this page, tap Choose files and select the screenshot, then tap Extract Text. On supported iPhones, Photos also offers Live Text for selecting text directly; that is separate from uploading here.

Android

Take and save a screenshot using your phone’s screenshot shortcut (often Power + Volume Down). Tap Choose files here, select the saved image and tap Extract Text. Some phones offer text selection through Google Lens or their gallery; availability varies by device.

Text worth keeping

  • Lecture slides: capture one slide at a time, extract its wording, then add your own notes. Diagrams and equations need a manual check.
  • Error messages: copy the exact message into a search or support request. Check punctuation and remove private details before sharing.
  • Reference screenshots: turn a reading list, event notice or instruction into a searchable note without retyping every line.

Help OCR read your screenshot

  • Use the original screenshot rather than a compressed copy sent through messaging apps.
  • Crop out menus, avatars and unrelated text before uploading. Crop separate columns individually when reading order matters.
  • Increase text size in the source app before taking a new screenshot. Enlarging a blurry image cannot restore lost letters.
  • Review punctuation, code and symbols in the editable output. Complex layouts can produce missing or reordered words.

Screenshot to text questions

Is screenshot to text free?

100 free extraction units per day for guests and free signed-in users. One image uses one unit; each PDF page uses one unit. Both pages share your allowance. Free quotas reset at midnight UTC. Signing in enables history; it does not add a second allowance to your account.

Can I copy text from a screenshot on my phone?

Yes. Save the screenshot, tap Choose files, select it from Photos or Files, and tap Extract Text. Review the editable result, then copy it or download a .txt file. You do not need to install an app or sign in.

Can I paste a screenshot from the clipboard?

On browsers that provide an image in a paste event, use Ctrl+V on Windows or Cmd+V on Mac while this page is open. Pasting adds a preview; you still click Extract Text. A copied file path or image URL is not an image. If no preview appears, save the screenshot and upload it instead.

What files and sizes can I upload?

Upload JPEG/JPG, PNG, WEBP or GIF screenshots up to 10 MB each. The shared tool also accepts PDFs up to 10 pages and 10 MB per upload. Convert other formats to PNG or JPEG before uploading. Output is editable plain text, with copy and .txt download options.

What happens to my screenshot and extracted text?

Your upload is sent to our server and Google Cloud Vision for OCR; processing is not entirely on your device. Guest extracted text is returned to your browser without being saved to extraction history. Signed-in extractions save the filename and text to your private history until you delete them. Uploads are not kept permanently on our servers; temporary PDF files are cleaned up after processing. We retain usage and analytics metadata, not guest OCR content. See our privacy policy for provider and retention details.

Will code, punctuation and layout be copied exactly?

OCR can confuse quotation marks, brackets, symbols and similar-looking characters such as 0 and O. Columns may appear in the wrong reading order. Check the result against the screenshot before using it, especially for code or error messages. This tool returns plain text and does not preserve formatting or extract structured tables.

Working with a photo or scanned document? Use our image to text converter. Learn more about privacy and free usage limits.