- PowerToys Text Extractor uses OCR technology to copy text from any area of the screen using the Win + Shift + T shortcut.
- The Windows 11 Snipping Tool offers a built-in native alternative through its Text Actions feature.
- It is essential to have the corresponding OCR language packs installed on the system to ensure that the text is recognized correctly.
Have you ever come across an image or video and thought how great it would be to copy the text without having to type it all out by hand? Well, if you use Windows 11, you don't need to drive yourself crazy looking for complicated solutions or paying for expensive subscriptions, because you have powerful tools at your fingertips that do the dirty work for you in no time.
The magic behind this is OCR, which, for those unfamiliar with the term, stands for Optical Character Recognition . Basically, it's the technology that allows the computer to "read" an image and convert those pixels into editable text that you can paste into Word, Notepad, or wherever you like, saving you a lot of time and headaches.
How to get the most out of PowerToys Text Extractor
If you want to take your PC productivity to the next level, you need to install Microsoft PowerToys . It's simply a suite of utilities for users who want to get the most out of Windows. One of its gems is Text Extractor, a tool that lets you capture text from anywhere on your screen, whether it's a photo, a video clip, or a website that doesn't allow you to copy the content.
To get started, you first need to download PowerToys from the Microsoft Store. Once installed, open the application and go to the "More tools" section in the side menu. There you'll find the Text Extractor; make sure the "Enable Text Extractor" switch is turned on. By default, the command to activate it is Win + Shift + T , but if you don't like it, you can change it by clicking the pencil icon and defining your own key combination.
It's incredibly easy to use: press the shortcut, the screen dims slightly, and then simply click and drag the mouse over the area containing the text. As soon as you release the button, the system processes the image and saves the text directly to the clipboard , ready for you to copy and paste (Ctrl+V) in any document. If you accidentally select the wrong area, remember that you can hold down the Shift key to move the captured region without changing its size, and if you want to cancel the entire process, simply press Esc.
Advanced OCR settings and languages
For this tool to work perfectly, your system needs to have the OCR language pack installed that corresponds to the text you want to extract. If you notice that it doesn't recognize the words correctly, you probably don't have the appropriate language pack.
If you're a more advanced user and want to manage this using commands, you can open PowerShell as administrator To check which languages you have installed, use the command Get-WindowsCapability -Online | Where-Object { $_.Name -Like 'Language.OCR*' }, you will be able to see a list where "Installed" means it is active and "NotPresent" that's missing. To add a new one, such as US English, use the command Add-WindowsCapability -Online filtering by the desired language.
Occasionally, some users may encounter the error "No OCR languages are installed ." If you're sure the package is there but the program doesn't see it, and it turns out your system isn't installed on the C: drive, an effective solution is to copy the OCR folder from your X: drive to the path C:/Windows/OCR.
Quick alternatives: Snipping Tool and other apps
If you don't want to install additional programs, Windows 11 already has a very decent built-in option in the Snipping Tool . Simply take a screenshot (Win + Shift + S), open the captured image, and click the "Text Actions" button . From there, you can easily copy all the content of the image.
For those seeking other options, there are very capable external tools. For example, Google Keep allows you to import images and extract text from its web version, while Microsoft OneNote also offers powerful OCR capabilities. And if you work with complex PDF documents that don't allow editing, remember that tools like Adobe Acrobat Reader have their own recognition systems, although some of their more advanced features require a paid subscription.
It's common for minor issues to arise, such as the keyboard shortcut ceasing to work or displaying a message that the combination is already in use by another application. In these cases, the simplest solution is to access PowerToys' settings and assign a new command to avoid conflicts with other programs running in the background.
We now have various ways to digitize visual information, from the simplicity of the native Snipping Tool to the total versatility of PowerToys and external applications such as Google Keep or OneNote, allowing us to transform any graphic element into editable text using OCR technology and manage the necessary language packs so that recognition is accurate in any language.