How to Scan a Business Card with Your iPhone
Switch to Business card mode, put the card on a contrasting matte surface, and let edge detection frame it. Glossy laminate and spot-UV printing reflect badly, so use indirect light and tilt the card rather than the phone. Text recognition runs on the device, and exporting to PDF or JPG is free with no watermark.
Tools used: Crop & perspective fixOCR text recognitionJPG exportPDF conversion
Step by step
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Open Business card mode
Business card mode expects a small landscape rectangle rather than a full sheet of paper, so framing and cropping are tuned for that shape. This matters because a card occupies a small part of the frame and a document-shaped detector tends to hunt for the table edge instead. Pick the mode before you start rather than cropping down from a page scan.
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Pick a background that contrasts with the card
A white card on a white desk gives edge detection nothing to find, and a black card on a dark table has the same problem in reverse. Use a plain matte surface a few shades away from the card's color. Avoid glass, glossy laminate desks, and patterned placemats, which all confuse the outline.
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Kill the glare from coated stock
Most cards are laminated, and many use spot-UV or foil for the name and logo, which mirrors any light source straight into the lens. Move away from direct overhead light and use indirect daylight, then tilt the card a few degrees rather than tilting the phone. A blown-out white patch across the name cannot be recovered afterwards.
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Capture the back as well
Plenty of cards put the mobile number, a second-language version of the name, or a QR code on the reverse. Flip the card and capture it as a second page so both sides stay together in one file. Skipping the back is how half the contact details go missing.
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Run OCR, check it, then export
OCR makes the name, phone number, and email selectable so you can copy them into Contacts yourself. Check the characters carefully — small display typefaces, thin grey text, and letters printed over a logo are the weakest cases. Export as JPG for a quick image or PDF to keep front and back in one file.
Frequently asked
- Does it add scanned cards to my Contacts automatically?
- No. OCR recognizes the text so you can select and copy it, but you paste it into Contacts yourself. There is no address-book sync and no server-side processing — recognition runs on the device.
- Can it read cards in Korean, Japanese, or Chinese?
- Yes. OCR supports auto-detect, Latin, Korean, Chinese (Simplified), and Japanese, which covers most bilingual cards where one side is local script and the other is English. Scripts outside that list are not supported. Additional language packs are part of the paid extras; core scanning and export stay free.
- Why does the card scan come out with a bright white streak?
- That is a reflection off the card's coating, and glossy or spot-UV finishes cause it even in ordinary room light. Move out of direct light, scan next to a window with indirect daylight, and angle the card slightly. Post-processing cannot recover detail from a fully blown-out area.
- How do I scan a stack of cards from an event?
- Capture them one after another in a single session, front and back, and export as one multi-page PDF so the batch stays together. Work in a consistent spot with the same lighting so you are not re-adjusting for every card. Do the OCR check pass afterwards rather than between each card.
- What if the card has a QR code on it?
- Use QR mode to read a QR code and get its content, rather than trying to have OCR interpret it. If you want the code preserved as part of the card image, scan the card normally in Business card mode instead. The two are separate jobs.
Last updated 2026-07-28