An old receipt, a printed letter, a hand-signed form. Paper documents become useful digital ones when scanned to PDF. The phone in your pocket can do this — sometimes better than a flatbed scanner.
Use your phone's document mode
iOS Files → Scan Documents. Android Google Drive → Scan. Both auto-detect page edges, correct perspective, and improve contrast.
Result: a clean PDF with one document per page. Faster than a flatbed for short documents.
Use a flatbed scanner for quality
For multi-page documents, archives, or anything requiring high resolution, a flatbed scanner is better. Scan at 300 DPI for normal text, 600 DPI for fine print or images.
Save directly as PDF (most scanner software supports this). The result is sharper than phone scans.
Combine and OCR
For multi-document scans, merge into one PDF in order. Then run OCR so the text is searchable.
Final step: compress for archival. Scanned PDFs compress well — often 60-80% with no visible loss.
Name and store
Name the file usefully: `2026-05-12_receipt_groceries.pdf`. Add metadata — title, subject, keywords — for findable archives.
File in a consistent folder structure. Searchable filename + searchable content via OCR = a real archive.
FAQ
Phone scan or flatbed scanner?
Phone for speed and single documents. Flatbed for quality, multi-page archives, or anything that has to look perfect.
What DPI for scans?
300 for text. 600 for images or small print. Higher wastes file size.
Will OCR work on my phone scan?
Yes, after the scan is saved. Run OCR on the resulting PDF.
Should I scan in colour or black-and-white?
Colour for anything with images or coloured stamps. Black-and-white for plain text — smaller files.
Can I scan multiple pages into one PDF?
Yes — phone document mode and scanner software both support multi-page PDFs. Or scan to separate files and merge.
Scanning to PDF is one of the most useful PDF workflows. Scan, merge if needed, OCR, store. The whole flow takes minutes.