The 13 Best Free PDF Scanner Apps for iPhone and iPad

PDF is a standard format among office documents, and it is often used by users who often receive or send files. Sometimes, we need to scan paper documents or some pictures into PDFs. This is the PDF scanning application we are going to use. It is usually a professional mobile phone scanner and document management tool. Ability to turn your phone into a portable scanner: scan, edit and share any printed document.

The post here will recommend various PDF scanner apps available on the iOS system, like iPhone and iPad that can scan pdf directly. Some of them also offer DPI adjustments to reduce the sizes of scanned documents, check their functions and pick one to use.

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Comparison of the 13 Best Free PDF Scanner Apps

App	Price	App Store Rating	Compatibility	Key Features
Adobe Scan	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.9/5	iOS 15.0 or later	Capture text or images with an inbuilt OCR function
SwiftScan	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.8/5	iOS 13.0 or later.	Optimize images when scanning
Apowersoft Scanner	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	3.0/5	iOS 10.0 or later.	Annotate scanned files freely
iLovePDF – PDF Editor & Scan	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.7/5	iOS 11.0 or later.	Take a photo and convert it to PDF
Microsoft Office Lens	Free	4.8/5	iOS 15.0 or later.	Convert images to PDF, Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files
Scanner Pro	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.9/5	iOS 11.2 or later.	Share scanned files to iCloud, Email, and Dropbox
Prizmo	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.5/5	iOS 12.2 or later	Text reader & voice
Scanner	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.7/5	iOS 12.1 or later	Back up and share scanned files
CamScanner Free	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.9/5	iOS 12.0 or later.	Back up in the Cloud storage space
QuickScan	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.9/5	iOS 13.3 or later.	Text recognition with OCR
Notes (Inbuilt)	Free	3.3/5	iOS 10.0 or later.	Save the scanned documents as PDF
PDFelement	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.4/5	iOS 13.0 or later	Edit PDF text with an OCR feature
Genius Scan	Free; Offers In-App Purchases	4.9/5	iOS 15.0 or later	Share scanned files to the cloud

Adobe Scan

Adobe is professional and authoritative in coping with PDF documents. Actually, it is a designer of the PDF file format. Therefore, Adobe Scan must be on the top list when it comes to the best PDF scanner app on mobile. Adobe Scanner can help you scan documents into high-clarity PDF pages. Moreover, it also allows you to edit the scanned PDF file, which is a unique feature. However, Adobe Scanner is not entirely free to use. What’s more, compared to other charged PDF scanner apps for iOS, its pro version costs expensively. Adobe Scan is also a worthy option on our list of the best free scanner apps for Android.

Product Features:

• View, edit, and enhance documents.
• Capture text or images with an inbuilt OCR function

SwiftScan

SwiftScan is another highly recommended PDF scanner app for iPhones and iPad. It has various unique features, which other PDF scanner apps don’t provide. For example, it supports file renaming, faxing, and organizing. Moreover, it can automatically adjust the image parameters, like brightness, sharpness, etc., when you scan the document. Also, it can help you send scanned files to the cloud. But the downside is it will put a watermark on the scanned PDF pages in the free version.

Product Features

• File naming, faxing, and rearranging
• Optimize images when scanning
• Back up in the cloud

Apowersoft Scanner

Apowersoft Scanner can be said to be the most comprehensive PDF scanner app. Except for the common features, like converting images to PDF, OCR PDF texts, backing up in the cloud, etc., Apowersoft is also equipped with other helpful features. For instance, it allows you to add comments and annotations to scanned PDF files. You can also e-sign the PDF and print it directly. This app prevents you from large and inconvenient copy and scan machines and makes your office work easier.

Product Features

• Recognize text with an inbuilt OCR feature
• Back up files in the cloud
• Annotate scanned files freely

iLovePDF – PDF Editor & Scan

Like Adobe, iLove PDF also digs into the office PDF document editing field. It is well-known as a handy and powerful PDF processing software. Apart from that, iLove PDF also explored a PDF scanner app, helping you transform other files into PDF format. It is a convenient PDF scanner app without those unnecessary designs. You can use it to scan paper files, images, and more. Also, you can take a picture and save it as a PDF page directly using this app. Other default editing tools allow you to modify the scanned PDF, as well.

Product Features

• Take a photo and convert it to PDF
• Recognize text with an inbuilt OCR feature

Microsoft Office Lens

Microsoft Office Lens is a PDF scanner app launched by Microsoft, which is a part of Microsoft Suites. It is free to use and reliable. You can use it to scan files on iPhone and iPad. Inherited with tradition, Microsoft Office Lens has a clear user interface. It is easy for new users to perform. Except for PDF format, you can also directly scan documents into Word, PPT, Excel, etc. But some users’ feedback says that there will be unnecessary white lines on their scanned documents. If you don’t mind of this flaw, it is one of the best PDF scanner apps on the iOS system.

Product Features:

• Convert images to PDF, Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files.
• Back up in OneNote, OneDrive

Scanner Pro

Scanner Pro is also an experienced PDF scanner app compatible with iPhone and iPad devices. It is free to download from App Store. But it asks you to pay for the scanning features when you use the app. Prominently, it allows you to scan multiple documents simultaneously and convert them to PDF files. What’s more, Scanner Pro permits you to share the scanned file on iCloud, Dropbox, Email, etc. Therefore, you can immediately send the file to others.

Product Features:

• Recognize text with an inbuilt OCR
• Share scanned files to iCloud, Email, and Dropbox

Prizmo

Prizmo is another effective PDF scanner app for iOS. You can choose to scan a file and save it as PDF, JPG, or PNG. The most appealing feature of it is that it can change scanned files into editable ones. You can edit the text directly. But one downside is that it sometimes recognizes the content as the wrong text. This is a common phenomenon when we scan files. In addition, it also provides a text reader function, allowing you to scan files easily.

Product Features:

• Edit and export documents
• Text reader & voice

Scanner

Scanner is a handy file scanner tool accessible on iPhones and iPad. It offers a straightforward user interface and a smooth scanning process. It allows you to scan a file into PDF, image, and .txt files. Except for the scan feature, you can also use it to convert images and screenshots to an entire PDF document. Also, it will help you share the managed document to the cloud and email if you have such a need.

Product Features

• Scan and convert images to PDF
• Back up and share scanned files

CamScanner Free

CamScanner provides a free version for you to scan documents into PDF pages. It is so powerful that you can see several advanced scanning features available on those highly charged apps. For example, it supports file scanning, merging, Google Drive backup, etc. But it also has disadvantages. After scanning, there will be CamScanner’s brand watermark on the scanned files. To remove it, you have to pay for the premium version.

Product Features

• File scanning and merging
• Back up in the Cloud storage space
• Recognize text with an OCR feature

QuickScan

Quick Scan works just like its name. It can quickly scan your documents and export them as a whole or separated PDF files. It is a tiny application, but provides comprehensive PDF scanning features. You can use its in-built OCR feature to recognize texts and other objects in the file. In addition to PDF, you can also choose to save the scanned content as a JPEG image file. Sharing to iCloud is also feasible so that you can avoid the loss of critical files by accidental deletion.

Product Features

• Text recognition with OCR
• Export scanned file to PDF, image, .txt
• Back up files in cloud

Notes (Inbuilt)

As for the best PDF scanner app on iPhone and iPad, the default Notes must be many users’ first choice. It is totally free to use. And to use it, you don’t have to install extra third-party applications. It is not complex to scan documents into PDF using Notes. Just scan files with the camera and save them in PDF format. Like other paid apps, Notes also can recognize text in a file with high accuracy. Suppose you are unwilling to spend time and effort selecting apps; the in-built Notes is the best option.

Product Features

• Recognize text in documents
• Save the scanned documents as PDF

PDFelement

PDFelement is an all-around PDF editor that also supports PDF scanning. It can improve your productivity with various file viewing and editing tools. You can use it to convert any kind of image to a PDF file or import other file formats and export them to PDF. Meanwhile, it allows you to merge the separated scanned PDFs within the app. With its inbuilt OCR tool, you can modify the text and images. But these advanced features are charged. And as for the free version, there will be watermarks on the edited PDF.

Product Features

• Easily change images to PDF
• Create PDFs from other documents
• Edit PDF text with an OCR feature

Genius Scan

Genius Scan is the last best free PDF scanner app we’d love to recommend to you. It has a relatively high score in App Store. It has a powerful image and file scanning feature, which can scan clearly with high accuracy. Its default OCR feature helps you to modify the scanned text without effort. Meanwhile, you can save the scanned files in multiple formats, like PDFs and photos. Activating the pro version, you can send the scanned files to the cloud, like Google Drive, iCloud Drive, OneDrive, OneNote, FTP, SugarSync, WebDAV, etc.

Product Features

• Scan files into multiple file formats
• Edit PDF text with an OCR feature
• Share scanned files to the cloud
• FAQs on Best Free PDF Scanner App

FAQs

What’s the best free scanner app for iPhone?

There are various helpful PDF scanner apps for iPhone and iPad users in the industry. The best ones are:

• Adobe Scan
• SwiftScan
• Microsoft Office Lens
• Scanner Pro
• CamScanner Free
• QuickScan
• Genius Scan

What’s the best free QR scanner for iPhone?

The best free QR scanner apps for iPhone right now are:

• QR Code Reader – QRScan
• QR Code Reader for iPhone/iPad
• QR, Barcode Scanner for iPhone

What’s the best free scanner app for iPhone for barcodes?

The best free scanner app for iPhone and iPad for scanning barcodes overall is QR Code & Barcode Scanner from the Apple app store, it supports different types of barcode and is very reliable and practical.

What’s the best free scanner app for iPhone without subscription?

There is an inbuilt PDF scanner application on iPhone, that is, Notes. Meanwhile, the Microsoft Office Lens is also entirely free to use without a subscription.

Wrapping Up

Here, we select the 13 best free PDF scanner apps after careful testing and comparison. All these applications are searchable in the App Store. Quick scan their main usages and other product features, then pick one to install for long term use.