Instant OCR is an optical character recognition software that is just like any other OCR software. It provides the service of optical character recognition, that is, it scans data from a source, matches the characters with the ones that are available in its database and replicates the character in a word file or a text document. Its main purpose is to convert an image of a document from a scanner into a text searchable and editable version of the document as a text file.

Instant OCR is an online software by means of which, the optical character recognition service is provided on the internet by means of an OCR engine and an OCR server. The image files that are to be converted into a text file are to be uploaded onto the server providing the instant OCR service. The image file is then sent to the instant OCR server and the server sends it to one of the many OCR software equipped systems connected in its periphery and the converted file is then sent back to the user through e-mail.

Instant OCR usually supports many languages and the manual correcting service gives high accuracy to service providers. Good instant OCR software is typically very easy to use too. The input can be given in any format like HTML, PDF or any other image format too. The output will be sent in PDF format to the user to their email id.

Instant OCR is an online OCR softwar, so its integrity and confidentiality may be questioned. However, Instant OCR servers are really secure and the information fed to the servers is not used for purposes that are not intimated by the user.

One of the main disadvantages of OCR is that the scanned data may contain errors and discrepancies which may prove to be a grave error. Instant OCR providers also give an option to the users by means of which the instant OCR crew will proof read the scanned document and correct any errors that may be present in the file, thereby giving a 100% accurate document which cannot be obtained from any other OCR software or OCR engine.