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POST /api/pdf/ocr/read

PDF OCR Read API

Send the URL of a scanned PDF and get its text back as JSON, page by page with character counts. For paper invoices, letters and records that have no text layer.

  • Free plan
  • No credit card

Request

curl -X POST https://apdf.io/api/pdf/ocr/read \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer TOKEN" \
  -d file="FILE_URL"

From pixels
to plain text.

OCR recognizes the words on each scanned page first. You get the text itself, not another file to download.

scan, page 1 example
PDF
Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as
ISO 32000
"page": 1,
"characters": 2398,
"content":
PDF
Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as
ISO 32000
…
pages_total 3 characters_total 8,642
How a call runs
send
The PDF URL, plus an optional webhook_url
job
You get a job ID back right away
ocr
Each page is recognized as English text
read
The text is pulled out page by page
result
Page texts and character counts as JSON

Text from paper.

When documents arrive as scans, OCR gives your code the words without anyone retyping them.

Paper invoices

Read supplier invoices that arrive as scans, then parse the invoice number, the dates and the totals in your own code.

Incoming letters

Turn scanned mail into text you can classify, summarize or attach to the right customer record without typing.

Scans for LLMs

Give a model the text of scanned documents page by page, so it can answer questions about your paper records.

Archive indexing

Index the text of old scanned records in your search engine, while the original files stay right where they are.

Read scans from anywhere.

Get the words out of scans wherever they arrive. One account and one monthly allowance behind every route.

Your code

One authenticated POST from any language. Copy-paste samples in cURL, Node.js, Python and more.

POST /api/pdf/ocr/read
Open the endpoint docs
Zapier

Pick the action in any Zap and map files from earlier steps. No code and no servers to run.

Extract PDF Text With OCR
Use it in Zapier
n8n

Add the Apdf node to any workflow, on n8n Cloud or self-hosted, and chain it with your automation.

Read PDF content with OCR
Use it in n8n
AI agents

Let Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini or your own agent run it through the MCP server, on any paid plan.

read-pdf-content-with-ocr
See what agents can do

1,000 OCR extractions
a month. Free.

Start on the free plan and move up only when your volume does — up to 1,000,000 operations a month on Business.

  • One call is one operation, however many pages.
  • Only calls that do the work are counted.
  • Hard limits, so no surprise overage charges.
Plan PDF operations / month
Hobby Free
$0 / month
1,000
Pro
$39–$99 / month
20,000 – 60,000
Business
$149–$899 / month
100,000 – 1,000,000

OCR text extraction, answered

When pages are scans or photos. Text extraction reads the text a PDF already contains and returns scanned pages empty. It also answers in the same request, so use it for PDFs that were created digitally.
They work. Text that is already in the file is kept as it is and the scanned parts are recognized, so every page ends up in the result.
OCR recognizes English text, and there is no language parameter. Text in other languages may come out less reliably.
No, this call returns only the text. If you need the document itself with selectable text, use OCR convert, which returns the PDF with a text layer.
As a URL: Apdf downloads the file, up to 100 MB. In Zapier and n8n you can map the file from an earlier step instead.
After the API call

Your code made the PDF.
Then it went dark.

Opened, read, signed or ignored — you never see any of it. Send the PDFs you generate as personal links, and every open, page read, comment and signature comes back to your software as a webhook. Need it signed? Same link. Same account, same API key, one more call.

Your PDF, after sending Live
document:loaded CFO
page:read p4 · 38s
signature:signed 11:48

API · Webhook · MCP

Paper in.
Text out.