Translate a scanned document or a photo of text

A scan or a photo contains an image of text, not text. Recognize the text first, then translate it. Both steps take seconds.

On iPhone or iPad: use Mate's camera

Open Mate, switch to Camera, and take a photo of the page or pick one from your library. Mate recognizes all the text and shows translations on the photo, or as a list. This is the fastest route for paper documents, menus and signs. See Translate with the camera on iPhone.

On Mac: Live Text plus Mate

macOS recognizes text in images and scanned PDFs on its own, in Preview, Photos and Quick Look, on macOS 13 and later.

1. Open the scan or photo in Preview.
2. Move the pointer over the text; it turns into a text cursor. Select the passage you need.
3. Right-click and choose Services › Translate with Mate Translate. Or press Cmd+C and then Option+Shift+T with Auto-translate clipboard enabled in Mate's settings.

For a multi-page scan, select a page at a time. Mate takes up to 20,000 characters per translation.

Screenshots and images on web pages

Same thing: open the image in Preview, or press Cmd+Shift+4 to take a screenshot of the region, open the screenshot, and select the text with Live Text.

Tips for better recognition

• Even lighting and a straight angle matter more than resolution.
• Dark text on a light background recognizes best.
• If Live Text picks the wrong language, the words come out garbled. The document's language should be enabled under System Settings › General › Language & Region › Preferred Languages.