ABBYY has been being doing optical character recognition software since forever, but it’s now brought its software to mobile. If you want to capture text and make it actionable (click on links or ping out to map directions) this is an extremely useful app.
Its new ABBYYs TextGrabber 6.0 for iOS has just gone live on the Apple App store and it has real-time recognition capabilities and a completely re-designed interface.
The app can read text of any color from any background either via a photo or in real-time, with the recognition performed ‘on device’. Incredibly, it doesn’t even require an Internet connection. It will read 61 languages, the biggest number on the market in its category, and can capture text so it can be copied, edited, shared, or translated into 104 languages or even read using VoiceOver.
Point the app at some text and all the links, phone numbers, email addresses, street addresses and event details become clickable. It also works as a QR code reader.
This app is especially useful if you travel as it will translate text into your language of choice. Restaurant menus, anyone?
The new features use ABBYY’s proprietary Real-Time Recognition SDK. No photos are stored on your device, so you could use it in high security environments.
TextGrabber for iOS is available on the App Store for free until June 29 and usually costs $4.99. Translation is available as a separate in-app purchase for $3.99.
