Run OCR
Run OCR manually or automatically on import, and read the in-button progress as pages are recognized.
To turn a scanned page into searchable, extractable text, you run OCR on it. Scanix Desktop gives you two ways to do that: press the OCR button in the Viewer when you're ready, or let a template read pages automatically the moment they import. This page covers both, plus how to read the progress and re-run a page.
OCR reads the text off your pages so it can be searched, corrected, and pulled into fields. For what OCR is and how Scanix recognises a page, see the OCR overview.
Run OCR manually from the Viewer
The most direct route: open a document in the Viewer and press the OCR button in the right sidebar. It reads the page you're on, or every page you've selected.
Open the document in the Viewer
Import or scan your pages so they land in the Viewer. The right sidebar's action area holds the primary buttons.
Choose what to read
The OCR button targets the current page by default. To read more than one page in a single pass, select pages in the thumbnail strip first — the button label updates to match your selection.
- OCR · Current page — reads just the page on screen.
- OCR · N pages — reads every selected page (the label shows the count, e.g. OCR · 12 pages).
Press the OCR button
Click it once. The button itself turns into a progress bar and fills as pages are recognised — there's no separate dialog to watch.
Screenshot
The Viewer right sidebar showing the blue OCR button labelled OCR · Current page, with the green Process button beside it. — shot ocr-running-ocr-01
Reading the in-button progress
While OCR runs, the button stops being a button and becomes a live progress bar so you always know where a batch is. You'll see:
- A spinner and a running page count — Page 3 / 12 — naming the page being read and the total.
- A coloured fill that grows left-to-right as pages complete, with the percentage shown at the right edge.
When the run finishes, the button returns to its normal state. Because the pages now carry recognised text, the label changes to Re-OCR · Current page (or Re-OCR · N pages) — a signal that the work is done and your next stop is usually Process.
Screenshot
The OCR button mid-run, filled partway as a progress bar and reading Page 3 / 12 with the percentage on the right. — shot ocr-running-ocr-02
Re-OCR a page
Once a page has been read, the button reads Re-OCR instead of OCR. Press it to read the same pages again from scratch — useful after you've enhanced a page's image, switched its language, or want a clean recognition pass. It behaves exactly like the first run, including the filling progress bar.
If you change a page's image in the Viewer's Enhance panel, you don't have to come here to re-read it — the panel's Apply & Re-OCR button bakes the change and re-runs OCR in one step. See Image enhancement.
Run OCR automatically on import
For a hands-off, lights-out job, a template can read every page the moment it imports or scans — no button press required. This is a per-template setting, and it is off by default.
Turn on the template setting
Open the template and find its OCR Behaviour card. Switch on Auto-run OCR after import/scan.
Import or scan with that template
Start the import from that template (for example, from its card on Home). As the pages render, Scanix begins reading them for you.
Screenshot
A template's OCR Behaviour card with the Auto-run OCR after import/scan toggle switched on. — shot ocr-running-ocr-03
Auto-run OCR reads — it doesn't extract
Auto-run OCR after import/scan runs OCR only. It reads the text layer so pages are searchable and ready; it does not, on its own, run AI field extraction. To capture structured fields with AI on these pages, run Analyse with AI.
The "Preparing pages…" gate
When a template is set to auto-run OCR, Scanix waits for the first pages to finish rendering before it starts reading — recognising and rendering a large document at the very same instant can leave the window unresponsive. During that brief wait you'll see a readiness overlay:
- It reads Preparing pages… with a live count underneath — 3 of 20 pages ready.
- It clears on its own the moment enough pages are ready, and OCR begins.
If you'd rather not wait, click Skip OCR on the overlay to bypass the gate. Your pages stay open in the Viewer un-read, and you can press the OCR button yourself whenever you're ready.
Screenshot
The Preparing pages… readiness overlay showing 3 of 20 pages ready and a Skip OCR button. — shot ocr-running-ocr-04
Free imports never auto-OCR
A free import — dragging files onto the Home drop zone, or using the top-level Import Files button — opens your pages in the Viewer and stops there. It never starts OCR by itself, no matter any template setting, because no template is attached to that import. Read those pages yourself with the OCR button, or start the import from a template card instead. See Import files & images.
Troubleshooting
Next steps
Edit & correct text
Fix recognition mistakes and adjust text regions after a page is read.
Analyse with AI
Go beyond plain OCR — capture structured fields from your pages with AI.
OCR overview
What OCR is, how Scanix recognises a page, and where it fits in the workflow.
Related
- OCR overview — what OCR does and where it sits in the pipeline.
- Edit & correct text — clean up recognised text after a run.
- Analyse with AI — extract structured fields, not just text.