Use the Notes app to scan documents right now
Your iPhone has a document scanner built in, and it lives inside the Notes app — the yellow icon with a notepad. You do not need to download anything or pay for a separate app. Open Notes, create a new note or open an existing one, tap the camera icon at the bottom, and select "Scan Documents" from the menu. Point your phone at the document, hold it steady, and tap the white circle to capture. The iPhone automatically crops the edges, adjusts the angle, and converts the image to a clean black-and-white scan.
After you scan, the app shows you a preview. You can tap "Retake" to scan again, add more pages by tapping the plus icon, or tap "Save" to finish. The scans land in that note as images you can view, share, or export later. This method works for single pages, multi-page documents, receipts, contracts, and anything else flat enough to photograph.
Key Takeaways
- Open Notes, tap the camera icon, and choose "Scan Documents" to start scanning without downloading any app.
- The iPhone automatically straightens and converts your scan to black and white, so you do not have to adjust settings yourself.
- You can add multiple pages to a single scan by tapping the plus icon before you save.
- Scanned documents stay in your note and can be shared via email, Messages, or saved to Files.
- If you need to search text inside scans or convert them to PDF, the Files app and Mail can handle both tasks.
How to add multiple pages in one scan
When you scan the first page and see the preview, do not tap "Save" yet. Instead, tap the plus icon at the bottom left. This tells the iPhone you want to add another page. Position the next page in front of your camera, tap the white circle again, and the app captures it. Repeat this for every page you need. The iPhone stacks them all into one document.
Once all pages are scanned, tap "Save" and they all go into your note together. You can then share the entire stack as one file, or open the note later and export individual pages if you need them separately. This is faster than scanning pages one at a time and hunting for them later.
Save your scans as PDF or image files
After you save a scan to Notes, you can convert it to a PDF or keep it as an image. Open the note containing your scan, press and hold the scanned image, and tap "Copy." Then open the Files app (the folder icon on your home screen), navigate to a folder where you want to save it, tap the three dots at the top right, select "Paste," and the image lands there. From Files, you can rename it, move it to iCloud Drive or another cloud service, or email it.
To convert to PDF instead, open the note, tap the three dots at the top right of the note itself, and select "Print." In the print preview, pinch outward on the thumbnail at the bottom left — this opens a menu where you can tap "PDF" and then "Save to Files." Choose where to save it, and the scan becomes a PDF file you can open in Mail, share with others, or upload to websites that require PDF format.
Search for text inside your scanned documents
If you scan a document with printed text, your iPhone can search inside it without converting it to anything special. Open the note with your scan, swipe down from the top of the note, and a search box appears. Type any word or phrase that appears in the document, and the iPhone highlights it in the scan. This works because the Notes app runs optical character recognition (OCR) on your scans automatically — it reads the text even though the scan is technically an image.
This feature is useful when you scan receipts, contracts, or forms and need to find a specific detail later. You do not have to remember which page something was on; just search for it and the app shows you where it appears.
Share scans via email or Messages
Open the note containing your scan, press and hold the scanned image, and tap "Share." A menu appears with options to send it via Mail, Messages, AirDrop, or other apps you have installed. If you choose Mail, your default email app opens with the scan attached. If you choose Messages, you can pick a contact and send it as a text. The scan goes through as an image file, so the recipient can open it on any device.
If you want to send multiple pages as one file, convert to PDF first using the method described above, then share the PDF file from Files instead. PDFs are better for multi-page documents because they stay organized as a single file rather than separate images.
Fix a blurry or cropped scan
If your scan came out blurry, the edges are cut off, or the angle is wrong, open the note and tap the scan to select it. Tap "Edit" at the top right, and you can retake individual pages, adjust the crop by dragging the corners, or rotate the image. After you make changes, tap "Done" and the updated scan replaces the original in your note.
Blurriness usually happens when you move the phone while capturing or when the lighting is too dim. Steady your hand, make sure the document is well-lit, and hold the phone about six to eight inches away. If a page is cropped too tight, use the edit screen to drag the corners outward before you save.
Use the Files app if Notes is not convenient
The Notes app is the easiest route, but if you prefer to keep scans separate from notes, you can use the Files app instead. Open Files, navigate to a folder, tap the three dots at the top right, select "Scan Documents," and follow the same process. Scans land directly in that folder as image files instead of inside a note. This method works if you want to organize scans by folder from the start rather than moving them later.
The scanning quality and features are identical to Notes — the iPhone still auto-crops, straightens, and converts to black and white. The only difference is where the files end up. Choose whichever method matches how you like to organize things.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I scan a document that is larger than my phone screen?
Yes. Position your phone to capture one section, tap to scan, then move to the next section and tap again. The iPhone treats each capture as a separate page, so you can reassemble them later or crop them in the edit screen. For very large documents, this takes longer, but it works.
Do scanned documents take up a lot of storage?
A single page scan is usually between 500 KB and 2 MB depending on lighting and detail. A 10-page document might use 5 to 20 MB. If storage is tight, convert to PDF (which compresses better) or delete the original images after you export them to Files or email them somewhere.
What if the text in my scan is not searchable?
Handwritten text and very small print sometimes do not scan well enough for the iPhone to read. Printed text at normal size almost always works. If search is not finding something, the text may be too faint or the scan too blurry — retake it with better lighting and a steadier hand.
Can I edit the text inside a scanned document?
Not directly — scans are images, not editable documents. If you need to change text, you would have to use a separate app like Adobe Acrobat or Microsoft Word to open the PDF and edit it. For most purposes, scanning to keep a record is enough without needing to edit.
Will my scans sync to my Mac or iPad?
Yes, if you use the same iCloud account on all devices. Scans saved to Notes appear on your Mac and iPad automatically. Scans saved to Files sync if they are in iCloud Drive. Scans saved only to your iPhone's local storage do not sync — make sure to save to iCloud if you want them on other devices.