Make Searchable (OCR)
A scanned document is really just a picture of a page. You can see the words, but the computer can't — so you can't search it or select its text. Make Searchable fixes that with OCR (optical character recognition — the computer reading the text in the image) and adds an invisible text layer, all on your own machine.
How to do it
- Open the scanned PDF.
- Click Make Searchable (OCR) in the Tools panel.
- Wait while it works — you'll see it move through Starting, Processing, and Verifying.
- When it says Searchable — verified, use Save (or Save As) to keep the searchable version.
What to know
- It runs on your computer. The text recognition happens locally, using tools built into RaioPDF. Your pages are never uploaded.
- The page looks the same. OCR adds a hidden text layer behind the image — it doesn't alter how the document looks. Afterward you can search it and select text.
- It checks its own work. RaioPDF confirms a real, readable text layer was actually added. If OCR comes up empty, it leaves your document unchanged and tells you, rather than handing you a file that isn't really searchable.
- A few pages with thin text over a scan get a heads-up, not a wall. Normal OCR leaves pages that already carry a sliver of text alone, so a mostly-scanned page under a thin text layer comes through as-is. RaioPDF still hands you the searchable copy and names those pages, with a nudge to run Force OCR on them if you need real text there too.
- Your OCR'd copy is treated as unsaved. It opens as a fresh document, so closing it prompts you to save first — use Save As to keep it.
- You only need it for scans. A PDF that already has real text is searchable as-is.