• expired

[Android, iOS] Free - Mobile Doc Scanner (MDScan) + OCR (Was $7.49) @ Google Play

3250

It's back for it's yearly 3 days of free goodness for those who have not known they needed it until they had to scan and email medical certificates into work after contracting the spicy flu.

Link to the iOS version Expired

All image processing is done only on your device! No documents will go online without your desire!
"MDScan, or Mobile Doc Scanner for Android, is one of the best I have found."
TJ McCue, Senior Contributor, Forbes (https://www.forbes.com/sites/tjmccue/2020/04/24/no-desktop-s…)
Take a picture with your camera, edit it using the many enhancing features, save into a preferred format and share on social media, email, cloud services.
Not satisfied? We’ll refund you!
MDScan is a mobile doc scanner that allows you to scan any type of document using your phone camera. This could be receipts, text pages, coupons, posters, magazine articles, invoices, pictures, and any printed documents.

How does it work?

  1. Take a picture with your camera
  2. Choose an editing option (you can select “unenhanced”)
  3. Easily adjust the scan area using the 4 borders on the page
  4. Confirm the scan to the set dimensions (ready presets available)
  5. Choose filters to enhance the quality (optional)
  6. Save and Export into a PDF or JPG
  7. Share on Social Media, Email, Cloud Servers

Related Stores

Google Play
Google Play
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Apple App Store
Apple App Store
Marketplace

closed Comments

  • +1

    Downloaded thanks

    • +8

      Yes time to scan a whole bunch of sensitive documents including ones with my TFN

  • +1

    I recall an App like this before, and a recommended Scanning stand/accessory?

  • +5

    I know with Samsung phones that this stuff is built in to the stock camera, other phones might be the same

    • -1

      Is it? This is a spyware then

      • phones are spyware

        only exception is having something like grapheneOS installed and using it at it's max potential

  • +31

    Have been a long time happy user of Office Lens - which is especially good if you have Onedrive or Sharepoint in your life…

    …and it's always been free :)

    • +1

      Thanks mate. I got two good ones in the one post! Can't complain about that.

    • +1

      There's a AIO Office app now which I recommend now. I've gone from 5 or so app icons to one.

    • +3

      Seconded, I've been using Lens for ever, and not sure how these paid alternatives even exist.

    • +1 for Office Lens. It also does OCR that works, and is properly embedded in the PDF.

  • +6

    Google drive app has inbuilt scanner which does a decent job

    • +1

      yeah until you make a mistake and it loses your 9 page draft

    • Yea I use it to just for scanning receipts and stuff. Works well for me.

  • +4

    Google Drive app also has this built in fir free and automatically saves it on the cloud.

  • Mark

  • +1

    This and Office lens are both great free options for those wishing for a non-OEM app

  • -3

    Mobile Doc Scanner

    I tried this, and my GP called the police… It got a bit complicated after that…

    • +3

      It's 2022 and I dont know if this is a joke or serious. 😅

      • +1

        If it’s a joke, I’m finding it very hard to see why

  • How does this compare with Adobe Scan?

    • It's a lot cheaper. In fact free! :)

      • +2

        Adobe Scan is free.

        • Doesn't it keep your scans in their cloud unless you pay a subscription?

          • +1

            @[Deactivated]: It keeps all the scans on the local device and also uploads them to Adobe Online, which requires a subscription to use, but you can ignore the latter and upload the scanned files to another location like OneDrive, Dropbox, etc.

      • Adobe scan is free too?

    • Exactly what i thought. I got adobe scan and is free (my android phone). They also store your doc in their cloud (which may be good or bad depends on individual circumstances)

      • Yeah that's the bit you have to pay for. If you want to copy those files and access them on your own system it requires payment I think.

        • You can email it to yourself for free

  • +3

    Looks like ios is also free atm? (down from $7.99 i think)
    https://apps.apple.com/au/app/mobile-doc-scanner-mdscan/id16…

    • Cheers. I will add it to the description.

    • Seems to be only for ipad though.

      • +1

        I installed into my iPhone 13 pro without issues
        https://ibb.co/xmb5zM8

        • Thanks! Accessed the link from my phone and it worked. Was doing it all wrong, searching from my phone didn't work for some reason, and clicking the IOS link from my mac said it was only for ipad.

  • +1

    MS One drive also got this feature to scan/take a photo to be a document.

  • +1

    I don't understand why this exists. What's wrong with just… taking a photo and sending that? It's what I've always done even for important documents. The app literally just takes a photo your phone took and makes it a PDF? Is that really desired by people?

    • +1

      It does a bit more than that. Download and try. Doesn't cost you anything. It will make your photo of a document solution look very unprofessional in comparison.

    • I was thinking the same. Extra steps for the same results

    • +6

      It exists to fix the distortion caused by the angle you take the photo at, and to crop the actual document from the background, and to OCR the photo of the text into actual searchable text.
      None of those things happen when you just take a photo.

    • +1

      Way easier to read. You can scan multi page documents. Tag them. Use OCR. Use it to store receipts for one use case. This app isn’t special in that regard but, just to give you an idea of why people may use it.

    • Ever been in a meeting (or class) and at the end someone asks for someone to copy the notes from a whiteboard. You can sit at the side.of the room, snap the pic into a square A4 shape, with many of these you can enhance the contrast and email it to yourself from the phone.

      My other use is when there has been a physical copy of a doc but a lost file that someone wants modified. Snap, scan with OCR and save as an editable text. Copy and paste from there into a new document and make your changes without having to rewrite the whole thing.

      Lots of people withexpenses like being able to scan a clear copy and submit from wherever they are to get the reimbursement happening before they are back to the office.

      Software like this and Otter are must haves.

  • +4

    What’s the difference between this and iPhone’s inbuilt document scanner? Seems like an additional, unnecessary step?

    • Which app is the iPhone inbuilt app?

      • +8

        Long press on ‘notes’ and there comes ‘scan document’.

      • You can simply open your camera, focus on the document, then automatically a pop up comes up saying scan.

        • oh wow didn't know that, i tried that before but never saw that pop up, i'll look out for it

      • Any of the native document apps on iPhone like notes, files or even using the mail app.

  • Thx OP, downloaded and next time i won't need to attach an ugly photo of my bill or letter and be more professional!

  • Isn't this just taking a photo of a document lol? Can't I do that with my camera?

    • +2

      Scanned files give you a clean and more professional document-like image that is on a white background with black letters.

      • Yep, and it 'flattens' the image. Makes it look like a document and not a photo of a piece of paper.

  • Had this for ages from a previous free offer.. very handy and very good.

  • +3

    My Samsung camera automatically has a scan option. Is this in any way superior?

  • Android forgot about tif files. Been looking for a way for my android mobile to scan into tif. Any ideas.

  • PSA the Google Drive app has a feature to scan documents/receipts and upload them to your drive as a PDF. Doesn't have OCR though, but for those who just need a digital scan of their receipts, it's a good option.

  • I use the free Notebloc which seems better quality with background removal.

  • +2

    All good if you want a third party app. As an alternative, Apple IOS now has a document scanner built into a few of its utility apps. You can scan a document from Notes or Files ( or more, these are the ones I’ve used), and then email, text or save the document onto the device’s storage or iCloud storage. I used Genius scan for more than 5 years, but have no need for it since this IOS update.

  • +2

    I’ve been using CamScanner. It’s free and it’s better than this app except it has ads. The main advantage is the auto crop feature. This one you have to manually crop around the document. The quick email feature of this app seems a little buggy too. Pro it has no ads.

    • This one you have to manually crop around the document.

      It autodetects the edges of the document and yeah you have to tap the tick. Not exactly manual.

      • It doesn’t always detect the edges of the document correctly so you have to manually adjust. CamScanner works better imo.

    • +1

      I have been using CamScanner too but be aware there has been some security concerns about it. Certain free versions had been found to be sharing images I believe. Strictly banned in some workplaces.

      • -1

        Which one is banned, CamScanner or free versions like this?

        • CamScanner was on the banned.list at.my.old work but due one occasion where there was some.malware in the ad supported free version. From memory.

  • +4

    If you have an iPhone, use notes for scanning and saving documents, you can also save scans as image or pdf.

    • thanks for the tip, didn't know I could do it in Notes.

  • Downloaded but I’d never pay for this app. I’m assuming there’s a way to default so it doesn’t scan as black-and-white?

  • "No data collected by developer" is a nice/rare treat.

    Often these free apps are asking for all sorts of permissions.

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