A “searchable PDF” is one whose words can be selected, copied and found with Ctrl-F. PDFs exported from software usually have a text layer already; FernPDF reads it exactly and rebuilds it as a clean searchable file or a plain .txt you can use anywhere.
For image-only scans (a photo of a page), there is no text layer to read. They need true optical character recognition of the pixels, which is on our roadmap. Everything with embedded text works today, processed entirely on your device.
Step by step
1Open the OCR PDF tool.
2Drop your PDF.
3Choose “Searchable PDF” or “Plain text (.txt)”.
4Click “Run OCR” and download.
No upload · no account · no watermark
FAQ
Common questions
Try selecting text in any viewer. If you can highlight words, the text layer exists and extraction will be exact.
Image-only pages need pixel-level OCR, which isn't in the free on-device tool yet. Everything with embedded text works today.
Entirely in your browser. Contracts and records never leave your machine.