How to Copy and Extract Text from PDF Image: Offline and Online Solutions

When you have a PDF document and want to copy the content from it, the easiest method is to right-click on the block of text and copy it. But, when your PDF has a scanned image, or when the entire document is a scanned one, it is difficult to extract text from the PDF image.

Not anymore. With the sophisticated tools and methods, it has now been made easy. Let us explore a few easy-to-use methods for this purpose.

How To Copy Text From PDF Image Offline With PDFgear

PDFgear is one of the best and most easy-to-use tools for overall PDF management. It offers you two methods that can be used to extract text from PDF images. Let us explore the two solutions offered by the PDFgear Desktop.

Solution 1: Use the OCR feature

PDFgear provides the best AI OCR feature that supports copying text from PDF images. You can easily copy or even edit the text on a scanned PDF file or a PDF image with the OCR feature.

The OCR feature on PDFgear is equipped with support for over 30 languages and a batch OCR functionality. The complete PDF management solution makes it easy to edit, and search PDF files and extract the data from them easy.

How to extract text from PDF images using the PDFgear OCR feature:

Step 1: Launch PDFgear and add files

Download the PDFgear desktop app and add the image or the scanned PDF file using PDFgear. You can do so using the Open file option on the tool’s main screen.

Step 2: Extract text from PDF image

Once the PDF file opens in PDFgear, click on Home at the top menu and then click on OCR. Now, holding the mouse down, select the area that you want to extract text from. You can use the drag option to select the exact area from the image.

Click on Done once you have chosen the right area.

Step 3: Copy or save the text

The next screen will show the text copied from the area you selected. You can choose to copy it or paste it in any area of your preference or decide to save it in a TXT file.

Solution 2: Convert PDF to Text

Another method to extract text from a PDF image is by converting your PDF to an editable Text file using PDFgear. The PDF converter’s built-in OCR feature allows you to extract text from images. Once the file is converted, it becomes easy to copy the text wherever you need.

Step 1: Launch and open PDFgear

Launch PDFgear as outlined in the above solution, and click on the Convert from PDF option from the main screen. From here, you can choose PDF to Text. 

Step 2: Add file to PDFgear

Click on the Open File button. Browse for the file that you want to add to the software and select it. You can add multiple files to convert into Text. Specify the output path to save the converted file.

Check the OCR button to extract text from images in your PDF. For better OCR results, select the document language.

Step 3: Convert PDF to Text now

Click on the Convert button, and the file will instantly be converted into Text. From the Text file, you can now copy or extract the text as you would do on a Word file.

How To Extract Text from PDF Image Online Free

You can make use of an online tool to extract text from PDF if you are on a public computer. PDFgear offers an online tool as well for copying text from PDF images. It provides multiple features that keep it a notch above all the other free PDF management tools.

Step 1: Launch PDFgear online and add files

On any of your browsers, head to PDFgear PDF to Word converter. Add your files using the Choose Files option. You can even drag and drop files.

Step 2: Convert PDF to Word online

As soon as you choose the file and add it to PDFgear, the file or files are converted instantly. Once they are done, you can download them onto your computer.

How To Copy Text from PDF Image with Google Drive

Google Docs on Google Drive is a fantastic tool for managing your PDF files. It can even perform OCR on scanned PDFs or image files. However, it might have OCR errors and lacks formatting accuracy. If you want to convert PDF to Word without formatting loss, you need to look for the specific tools for the purpose.

Step 1: Go to Google Drive and log in to your account if you have not already done so.

Step 2: Go to Google Drive > New > File Upload and select your PDF image file.

Step 3: Once the file has been uploaded, open it with Google Docs. The formatting will be wrong, but the entire text will be extracted.

How To Extract Text From PDF Image in Acrobat

If you have Adobe Acrobat installed on your device, this would be the easier option to help you extract text from a PDF image easily. Do note that Adobe Acrobat is a subscription-based service, and the feature is not available on the free version.

Step 1: Launch your Adobe Acrobat tool and add your PDF file. You can do so through the Open menu and then selecting the file you want to add.

Step 2: Once the file is selected, go to Tools > Enhance Scans. Now choose Recognize Text > In This File. 

You can now extract text from the file as per your preferences.

How To Extract Text From PDF Images in Python

In today’s world focused on coding and related tasks, it is not uncommon to find people searching for how to copy text from PDF images using Python. Python comes with multiple libraries that can effectively extract text from PDF files.

One of the good options in this context will include:

Step 1: Make sure that you have installed Python on your device. We also expect you to have a knowledge of Python.

Step 2: You can install PyPDF2 by simply using the pip install PyPDF2 command

Step 3: Use the following command to extract text from a PDF file

reader = PdfReader(“example.pdf”)

page = reader.pages[0]

print(page.extract_text()

Replace Example.pdf with your PDF file.

In Conclusion

Those were the top 6 options to assist you in copying text from PDF files effortlessly. Yet, if you’re seeking free yet powerful OCR extraction and other capabilities, PDFgear’s desktop and online versions stand out. Its versatile features make it an essential tool for your needs.