Camscanner

Having an app that allows you to scan documents and convert them into PDFs is always handy. It is far better than taking pictures using your phone and sending them across, especially if you want to send documents for official purposes. These apps use the phone's camera to take a picture of your document, crop, edit, create a PDF, and then easily share it. They also provide additional options like merging files, adding password protection, watermarks, etc. There are several apps that allow you to do this and here's the CamScanner, which is packed with features and is quite popular.           

User Interface 

In terms of user interface, CamScanner sports a minimalistic look. On the homescreen you will find the tags on the left hand side and all your scans will be sorted according to them. You have the option to customise these tags. Basically, before clicking the picture of the document to scan you can select one of these tags; if you don’t then the image will be categorised in the Ungrouped category. At the bottom you will find the option to upgrade to the full version, the camera button and the options to delete, merge, share, add password protection, and change tag. 

The extensive setting options

On the top right are three dots, by clicking which you can access options like Setting, Sync, Sort, View, Cloud Space, Premium Account and Select Photo. This pretty much covers the home screen. Overall the UI is quite easy to navigate, even when clicking pictures, editing or sharing the document you have created. The only niggle is that the many icons do not have a descriptor, while some are obvious to understand, you will have to try the others to know what they are meant for. 

Features and performance 

To scan a document, first select the tag like say a business card or a note, and then click on the camera icon. You can opt for the system camera or use the camera layout of the app, which provides decent options like focus, flash, grid, and even allows you to determine the size of the image. You will find the option to switch to the system camera in ‘Settings’ under ‘Scan Settings’. However, if you opt for the system camera then you can’t use the batch scan feature. After you have clicked the image, the next step is to crop it. 

Editing your document is quite easy

Next it provides you with editing options with the help of which you can enhance the quality of scan, adjust the brightness, contrast and rotate the image as required. It also offers in-built modes like Original, Low Enhance, High Enhance, Gray and a B&W Document. Once you are done with tweaking the settings, you can click on the right mark to save the image. By default, it won’t save the image in your system gallery and you will have to activate the option from Settings.    

In the next screen you will see your scanned document, here you can name the document, create a PDF and share the document. Furthermore, clicking on the three dots bar will bring you options to set the PDF page orientation, page size, margins, set password and set tag. Clicking on the PDF icon will create the PDF. You can open the PDF, using Adobe Reader. Here again, clicking on the top bar will bring you several editing options like adding notes, highlight, adding text, signature, etc. If you click on the share option here, you will find limited options. To access the complete list of share options click on the image and open it full screen. 

Apart from the email clients and messaging applications, you can also upload the documents to cloud clients. In the full screen mode, you will also find other options like rotation, resize, option to add watermark and annotation. It also includes a very useful OCR option. First time around you will have to download the OCR client. When you click on OCR, it will scan the text from the document, which will make it searchable. This will come in handy, if you haven’t named or categorised your documents properly and have too many of them.  You can also select a picture from your album to scan it.        

You can customise the PDF size and even add password

CamScanner also allows you to scan a batch of documents when taking the images and later you also have the option to merge any required documents. To merge documents, go to homescreen and click on the edit icon that is placed next to the camera icon. Now click on the tick mark on the thumbnails of the documents you want to merge and then click on the icon that depicts two folders with a plus sign. It will ask you whether you want to merge and keep the old documents or simply keep the merged document. You can also select multiple files to add password, delete, share or even change the tags from here. 

In case you need to then it’s also possible to convert all the files into PDF in one go. You will find the option for the same under Scan Settings. CamScanner also allows you to set a password and take a backup of your files. You will find the options for the same under Setting in Security & Backup. You can create a backup on your SD card and restore the data when required. 

It provides several sharing options

Verdict 

We reviewed the ad-supported free Android version of CamScanner. The paid version will be devoid of ads, sans the watermark, no limitation on the number of annotations, extra cloud space, ability to share links with password protection, extract text from the documents, and few others. However, if you aren’t going to use the app that extensively then the free ad-supported version should suffice your needs. As you will still have access to all the major features provided by the app. The PDFs created using the free version will carry a watermark; however, this is placed at the bottom of the PDF and so isn’t jarring.   

CamScanner is available for Android and iOSplatform.