Scan Documents to PDF with Your Camera

Use your device camera or existing photos to make a multi-page PDF. Page edges are detected and straightened, and you can adjust the corners, rotate, crop and switch to grey or black-and-white for crisp text. Processing happens in the browser. This works with cameras, not physical scanners.

Drop photos of your documents

or use your device camera

JPG, PNG, WebP, HEIC (if your browser supports it)

Overview

What is Scan to PDF?

Scan to PDF turns photos of paper documents into a tidy PDF. Capture pages with your phone or laptop camera, or add photos you have already taken. Each page is straightened, cropped to the paper and cleaned up, then saved as one multi-page PDF.

A quick phone photo is rarely square: the page is tilted, the desk shows around it, and the light is uneven. This tool finds the edges of the page, lets you adjust the four corners, and corrects the perspective so the page looks flat. A black-and-white mode makes printed text crisp even with shadows. It uses your camera only; it does not connect to a physical scanner.

How it works

How to scan a document to PDF

Capture or add pages
Start the camera and capture each page, or add photos from your gallery or computer.
Straighten
Page edges are detected automatically. Open Crop & straighten to drag the four corners if they are off.
Enhance
Choose colour, grey or black-and-white, adjust brightness and contrast, and rotate if needed.
Order and save
Move pages up or down, pick A4, Letter or Fit image, and download the PDF.

Examples

Examples: choosing a colour mode

Document	Mode	Why
Printed letter, contract	B&W text	Adaptive threshold removes shadows and grey paper; text is sharp and files are small
Receipt on thermal paper	Grey + higher contrast	Faint print survives better than in pure black-and-white
ID card, coloured form, photo	Colour	Keeps stamps, signatures in blue ink and photos
Handwritten notes in pencil	Grey	Light strokes are kept instead of dropping out

Under the hood

How pages are straightened

Edge detection looks for the largest bright shape against a darker background, which is usually the sheet of paper on a desk. Its four extreme corners are a starting point that you can always adjust.

Perspective correction then maps those four corners onto a rectangle. Every output pixel is sampled from the matching spot in the photo, so a page shot at an angle becomes flat and square. The output size follows the real proportions of the page, not the photo.

Photo: 4032 × 3024 px, tilted page
Corners: detected, adjustable
Page: flat, cropped, A4 PDF

Use cases

Expense receipts

Capture a week of receipts, one per page, and attach a single PDF to your claim.

7 photosscan.pdf, 7 pages

Signed paperwork

Send back a signed form when you have no scanner: photograph each page, straighten, save.

cameraPDF

Make it searchable

Continue to OCR PDF with the scan to add selectable text, without uploading again.

Scan to PDFOCR PDF

Tips

Tips for better scans

Put the page on a darker, plain surface so the edges are easy to find.
Shoot from directly above in good light and keep your shadow off the page.
Fill most of the frame with the page, leaving a little background around it.
If the camera will not start, use Add photos; on phones it can open the camera app.

Page size

A4, Letter or fit to image

A4 and Letter place each straightened page centred on a standard sheet, which is what most offices and portals expect and what prints cleanly. Landscape captures get a landscape page automatically. A small or normal margin leaves a white border, useful when the edges of the photo are uneven.

Fit image makes each PDF page exactly the size of the scan at 200 dpi, with no border. It suits receipts, tickets and cards whose shape is far from A4. Black-and-white pages are also saved with stronger compression, so a ten-page letter usually stays well under a few megabytes.

Limitations

Camera only

There is no connection to flatbed or office scanners; use their own software for those.

Edge detection

White pages on white desks, busy backgrounds or folded corners may not be detected. Set the corners by hand.

Not searchable yet

Pages are images. Run OCR PDF afterwards to add a text layer.

Camera permission

The browser asks for permission; if you deny it or the device has no camera, add photos instead. Camera access requires a secure (https) page.

Privacy

The camera stream and photos are processed in your browser and are not uploaded to TryFormatter. The camera stops when you tap Done or leave the page.

Related tools

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I scan with my phone camera?

Yes. Tap Use camera and allow access; the rear camera is used where available. If the browser does not allow camera access, Add photos can open your camera app instead.

How is this different from Image to PDF?

Image to PDF places your images on pages as they are. Scan to PDF treats them as document photos: it detects and straightens the page, crops away the background and offers scan-style black-and-white enhancement.

Will the PDF text be searchable?

Not directly; scanned pages are images. After downloading, continue to OCR PDF to add an invisible, searchable text layer.

Does it work with my flatbed scanner?

No. It works with cameras and photos only. Scanners have their own software that can save to PDF.

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Add a drawn, typed or uploaded signature, initials and the date to a PDF, place and resize them, and download the signed file.

PDF Merger

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Compress a PDF to 100KB, 200KB, 500KB, 1MB, 2MB, or a custom limit. Fit under portal upload caps with automatic quality optimization.

PDF Metadata Editor

Edit or remove PDF metadata fields in your browser. No upload required. Change title, author, keywords, creator, and more.

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Capture or add pages

Straighten

Enhance

Order and save