Getting started

Often yes, but large volumes may require splitting into smaller files. Books with uneven writing, mixed layouts, or highly variable page quality may show inconsistent accuracy. Before committing to processing hundreds of pages, upload several representative samples first — free trial credits are included so you can test without cost.

Yes, but the quality of the original material makes a big difference. Faded ink, bleed-through, degraded paper, and antique handwriting styles can impact accuracy. Many users successfully process historical letters, diaries, and records, while more damaged pages may need manual correction. Because historical documents vary so widely, the best approach is to test a few representative pages using the free trial credits included with new accounts.

Handwriting OCR will attempt to read signatures alongside the rest of the page, but signatures are a special case — they're stylised by design and not optimised for legibility, so transcription accuracy varies widely from one signature to another.

What works reasonably well

• Printed name fields next to a signature line — those transcribe normally.
• Signatures that are essentially a clearly-written name (often from older or more formal documents).
• Cases where you only need to know whether a signature is present, not what it says.

What's harder

• Cursive or stylised signatures designed for personal flourish rather than readability.
• Initials or symbol-style signatures.
• Faded, crossed, or partially overlapping signatures.

If you need to preserve the signature itself

If the goal is to keep the signature image as visual evidence (rather than to transcribe it), use the DOCX or PDF export with original images embedded — see can the PDF export include the original handwriting?. The signature appears alongside the transcribed text rather than being interpreted as text.

Test before committing

Because signatures vary so much, the best way to know if Handwriting OCR works for your specific documents is to try the free trial on a representative sample. New accounts get free trial credits that don't expire while the account is active.

Yes. We handle a wide range of languages and writing systems, including all major European languages, Cyrillic, Arabic, and many Asian scripts.

No — there's no native iOS or Android app. Handwriting OCR is a web service, but the dashboard runs well in modern mobile browsers (Safari on iOS, Chrome on Android), and you can:

• Take a photo of a page from your phone and upload it directly from the browser
• View transcriptions from anywhere
• Download exports to your phone

For heavier work, use a desktop browser

Editing transcriptions, setting up custom extractors, and managing batch uploads are all easier on a desktop browser. We recommend using mobile for capture and quick checks, and desktop for anything more involved.

Why no native app?

Handwriting OCR is primarily an API and a workflow tool — most customers integrate it into their existing systems (custom apps, CRMs, document pipelines) via the API, rather than working through a standalone interface. A native mobile app would duplicate the dashboard's capture-and-upload flow without adding much over the mobile browser.

If you'd find a native mobile app valuable, let us know — we track this kind of feedback when prioritising future work.

We support many languages and writing systems, but accuracy varies depending on script complexity, handwriting style, and availability of high-quality training data. Rare scripts or niche historical styles may perform less reliably. Because results differ widely across languages, the best approach is to upload a representative sample — free trial credits are included with every new account so you can test quickly.

We support many languages, but accuracy can drop when a document mixes languages, switches scripts, or contains uncommon names and abbreviations. Some multilingual pages work well, while others are more challenging. The simplest way to confirm expected accuracy is to upload a representative sample — free trial credits are provided automatically so you can test without commitment.

No. The system is designed for flat, paper-like documents. Curved surfaces, textured backgrounds, shadows, or reflective materials usually prevent accurate recognition. If you need OCR for non-paper surfaces, results may be unreliable regardless of the language or handwriting style.

Accuracy varies based on handwriting style and document quality. Clean cursive or consistent handwriting works well, but extremely messy, irregular, or stylized writing can reduce accuracy. This is normal even for humans reviewing the same text. The best way to understand how well it works for your specific handwriting is to test it with a representative sample — we provide free trial credits when you create an account so you can evaluate it risk-free.

Accuracy improves with clean, high-quality scans. We recommend scanning at 300 DPI or higher, using strong contrast, flattening pages, and avoiding shadows. For handwritten notes, larger, more consistent handwriting and darker ink can help. If you want to understand performance on your specific material, try a few representative pages — free trial credits are available to evaluate accuracy before starting a larger project.

Yes — file size limits depend on how you upload:

• Dashboard uploads: up to 100 MB per file
• API uploads: up to 20 MB per file

We support PDF, JPG, PNG, GIF, HEIC, and TIFF. For multi-page documents, PDF is recommended. Multi-page TIFFs are also supported.

Handwriting OCR is a cloud service that converts handwritten and printed documents into digital text and structured data using AI specifically trained on handwriting.

What makes it different from traditional OCR

General-purpose OCR tools (Google Drive OCR, Adobe Acrobat, Apple Live Text) are tuned for printed text and tend to fall over on handwriting. Our AI is trained for handwriting recognition specifically, which gives it materially better accuracy on:

• Cursive, mixed cursive/print, and casual handwriting
• Historical documents and old letters (cursive from the 1940s onward works well)
• Forms with handwritten responses, lab notebooks, journals, doctors' notes
• Multilingual handwritten material — over 300 languages supported

What you can do with it

• Transcribe — turn handwriting and printed pages into editable text. Export to TXT, DOCX, PDF, or JSON.
• Translate — translate transcribed text in the same flow.
• Extract tables — pull tabular data into Excel (Pro and Business plans).
• Custom extractors — define specific fields to extract from forms or templates (Pro and Business plans).
• Use the API — automate any of the above. The API is available on every plan, including the free trial.

Privacy by default

Your documents are encrypted in transit and at rest, auto-deleted on a schedule you control, and never used to train our models. EU customers can opt for EU-only processing.

You can try it free — every new account starts with 5 free trial credits that don't expire.

The available output formats depend on the action you ran.

Transcription — converting handwriting or printed text into editable text:

• TXT — plain text, no formatting
• DOCX — Microsoft Word format, with optional embedded source images
• PDF — portable document, with optional embedded source images
• JSON — structured per-line text output

Tables extraction — pulling tabular data into a spreadsheet (Pro and Business plans):

• XLSX — Microsoft Excel format
• JSON — structured row/column data

Custom extractors — pulling specific fields from forms (Pro and Business plans):

• XLSX — one row per processed document
• CSV — same data, plain CSV
• JSON — structured per-field output

Original images in DOCX/PDF

When exporting to DOCX or PDF, you can optionally embed the original page images alongside the transcribed text. This is useful for review and archiving, but produces much larger files — turn it off for plain transcriptions you'll edit further.

Common causes include difficult handwriting styles, poor scan quality, mixed languages, faded ink, unusual layouts, or overlapping text. Even small quality issues can lead to misinterpretation. If accuracy seems unexpectedly poor, try rescanning the document or upload a few representative pages using your free trial credits so you can assess how well the system handles your specific material.