There are times when we need to send a scanned document to someone, but don’t have a scanner at home. Maybe we can’t find a printing center nearby where we can scan the necessary documents. Smartphones, however, come with a feature that gets us out of this mess. Even if you have Android or iOS, you can use one of the apps you find on your phone. How do we scan a document with the phone?
How to scan a document with an Android phone
If you have an Android phone and want to scan a document, you can do it very easily. With the help of the application pre-installed on your device, you will be able to scan any document you want. The Google Drive app will help us use the phone’s scanner. You just need to follow the steps:
- Open the Google Drive application and click on the sign located in the lower-right corner (+).
- Select the Scan function from the displayed menu, then take a photo of the document you want to scan and press the Done button.
- You can edit the scanned document.
- Finally, press the Done button.
- After the process is complete, you can access the scanned document from the Recents section (located in the upper left corner). You can share it via emailor a chat app.
How to scan a document with an iPhone
The scanning operation is similar for phones with the iOS operating system, but in this case you will use the Notes application. To scan a document using an iPhone you will need to follow these steps:
- Open the Notes app and tap the “+” symbol to create a new note.
- Then tap the Camera icon and select the Scan Documents option.
- Take a photo of the document.
- If the phone is in Automatic mode, the document will be scanned automatically. If you need to scan manually, tap the Shutter button or one of the volume buttons.
- Drag the corners to fit the scan to the page and select the Keep Scan option.
- Select Save or add additional scans to the document.
The Notes application allows you to edit scanned images. You can add more pages, change the color or add handwritten notes.
Other apps to use to scan a document with your mobile phone
CamScanner
This application helps you scan any type of document. It comes with a multitude of features and manages to scan documents quickly and efficiently. It is easy to use and also benefits from smart cropping and auto enhancement. This way, you don’t need to spend too much time cropping the picture.
Adobe Scan
It is one of the best document scanning apps that allows you to save documents in PDF format. The same happens with the Google Drive app.
EasyScanner
It is a very easy-to-use scanning application that provides users with text recognition and saving documents in PDF and photo format.
Microsoft Office Lens
It allows saving documents not only in PDF format, but also in Word or Power Point format. It requires a Microsoft account on the phone and the installation of Office on the smartphone, if you don’t already have it pre-installed.