Crisp Text Preservation
Grain applies only to bright background pixels — ink stays clean. Letters remain razor sharp at any zoom level.
Scan · Compress · Edit — one toolkit
Paperwork,
without the
busywork.
Give any PDF a convincing scanned finish, shrink files up to 60% smaller, and redact, annotate or sign PDFs — in one calm, focused workspace. No signup. Compressor and Editor are always free.
✓ No signup
✓ PDF · JPG · PNG · DOCX · ZIP
✓ Scanner: 3 pages free
BUILT FOR EVERYDAY DOCUMENT WORK
independents◈ teams⌂ creators✳ businesses
One workspace. More done.
Every document task,
under control.
From the first scan to the final export, ScanDrift brings three essential document tools together in one straightforward experience.
Scan & age
Turn clean PDFs and images into convincing scans — grain, warmth, skew, fringing and 14+ physics-based effect layers.
Open ScannerCompress with confidence
Shrink PDFs, images, Office documents and ZIPs for easier sharing, with quality controls for each file type.
Open CompressorEdit PDFs visually
Whiteout, blackout, highlight, draw, add text and stamps, then export a compressed PDF at the original page size.
Open EditorKeep files organized
Every scan, compression and edit lands in My Documents, saved in your own browser. Download it again or send it straight to another tool.
Open My DocumentsSign anywhere
Draw a signature or upload a PNG, then place, resize and rotate it — in the Editor or baked straight into a scan.
Add a signatureFine-tune the details
Control noise, tint, brightness, contrast, rotation and skew, or pick a real scanner model to set everything at once.
See the controls3Tools
14+Scan effects
60%Max compression
300DPI output
0Files kept on our servers
A simpler process
From clean file
to ready to send.
No complicated learning curve. Choose a tool, make your adjustments and export a document you’re happy to share.
Document preview↗ Open Scanner
SCANDRIFT · DOCUMENT PREVIEW
Project
Overview
Enhancement
Deep dive
What makes each tool different
Three tools, each with genuine depth. Here's what's under the hood.
PDF Scanner
3 pages free · $5 unlimitedPhysics-based optical simulation — not a filter. Apply scanner artefacts that look genuinely real.
RESIDENTIAL LEASEAgreement RL-2026-0418
RESIDENTIAL LEASEAgreement RL-2026-0418
Channel Misregistration
CCD-bar scanners read R, G, and B in separate passes. Sub-millimetre vibration offsets them, producing the characteristic colour fringing on text edges.
Auto Deskew
Projection-profile algorithm detects and corrects tilt up to ±10°, simulating real-world scanner misalignment convincingly.
Back Bleed / Show-through Advanced
Real paper is semi-translucent. Each page bleeds a faint ghost of its reverse side. Needs 2+ pages to activate.
Focus Gradient Advanced
Depth-of-field blur that increases away from a chosen edge — simulating a document that wasn't fully flat on the glass. Configurable edge and intensity.
Scanner Models
Canon Office, HP Home Budget, worn Library Xerox, Archive Flatbed 2005, Fujitsu Production and Magazine Print — each sets every control to match a real device.
File Compressor
Always free · No limitsPDF, images, Word docs, ZIP — all in one tool. Compress any file up to 60% smaller.
PDF−62%
Quarterly_Report_Q3.pdf12.4 MB → 4.7 MB
JPG−55%
site-photo-0412.jpg4.2 MB → 1.9 MB
PPTX−58%
Board_Deck_Final.pptx22.8 MB → 9.6 MB
Saved in total23.2 MB
PDF — Structure-Aware Compression
Our compression engine understands the PDF object model — recompresses embedded images while leaving vector paths, fonts, and text streams untouched. Output stays selectable and searchable.
Office files and ZIP
Handles DOCX, XLSX, PPTX by recompressing their embedded images, and repacks ZIPs at maximum deflate.
Quality Controls Per File Type
PDFs: High Quality (150 DPI), Medium (100 DPI bicubic), and Small File (smart rasterization). Images: quality slider from 20–100% with format conversion to JPEG, PNG, or WEBP.
Batch queue
Drop several files at once. Each one is compressed with the settings for its type, and you can download them one by one or all together.
PDF Editor
Always free · No limitsFull canvas annotation and redaction, in the browser. Redact sensitive content, annotate, sign, and export a compressed PDF.
RESIDENTIAL LEASEAgreement RL-2026-0418
APPROVEDJordan Morgan
Full Annotation Suite
Whiteout and blackout redaction, highlight, rectangle, circle, arrow, line, freehand pen, text with full font controls, stamps, and an eraser that removes any annotation. All with undo/redo up to 80 steps.
Signature — Draw or Upload Cross-tool
Available in both the Editor and the Scanner. Draw freehand on a canvas or upload a PNG. Place, drag, resize. The Editor embeds it into the exported PDF; the Scanner bakes it into the scanned effect.
Page tools
Page thumbnails, zoom, undo/redo and a layers list. Select, move and resize any annotation.
Process
How the scanner works
Drop file(s) here or click to browsePDF · JPG · PNG · WEBP · TIFF · BMP · Max 50 MB
PDF
Contract.pdf4 pages · 1.8 MB
01
Upload your file
Drop any PDF or image — JPG, PNG, WEBP, TIFF, BMP — up to 50 MB. Multi-page PDFs are handled page by page in parallel.
LightMediumHeavy
HP Home Budget — warm, grainy, fringing ⌄
02
Choose your preset
Pick Light, Medium, or Heavy — or select a scanner model, or open the Paper and Physics tabs to fine-tune 14+ individual effect parameters.
✓
Scan complete4 pages · 300 DPI
PDFImageZIP
↓ Download Contract_scanned.pdf
03
Download instantly
Receive a PDF, original image, or ZIP of PNGs — with warmth, grain, vignette, sensor artefacts, and physics-based effects baked in.
- Scanner: PDF, JPG, PNG, WEBP, TIFF, BMP. Compressor: PDF, JPG, PNG, WEBP, DOCX, XLSX, PPTX, and ZIP. Editor: PDF, JPG, PNG, WEBP. Maximum file size is 50 MB across all tools.
- The File Compressor and PDF Editor are always free with no page limits and no watermarks. The Scanner gives you the first 3 pages of any document for free. Beyond 3 pages requires a one-time $5 unlock, valid for 10 hours. No subscriptions, no recurring charges.
- No. The entire pipeline runs locally on your own machine. Files are deleted immediately after processing — nothing stored externally, ever.
- Absolutely. A common workflow is: edit the document first (redact, annotate, sign), export the edited PDF, apply the scanner effect to make it look physically scanned, then compress the result before sending. Each tool is independent — use any combination in any order.
- CCD-bar scanners read the red, green, and blue channels in separate physical passes. Even a fraction of a millimetre of vibration offsets them, producing colour fringing on the edges of dark text against a light background. Enabling this makes budget scanner profiles especially convincing.
- Yes — the compressor is completely free with no limits. It supports PDF, images (JPG, PNG, WEBP), Word and Office documents (DOCX, XLSX, PPTX), and ZIP files. Upload any file up to 50 MB and download the compressed version instantly. The $5 unlock only applies to the scanner tool when processing more than 3 pages.
- Yes — the editor is completely free with no page limits. Open any PDF or image, annotate it with whiteout, highlights, text, shapes, stamps, or a signature, then export as a compressed PDF. No account, no watermark, no restrictions.
- Grain is applied only to pixels above a luma brightness threshold — paper background only. Ink and text pixels are skipped entirely, keeping letters crisp.
- Only when your source document is or should appear to be a printed halftone — magazines, newspapers, offset-printed books. The effect is wrong for plain text documents. The "Magazine / Print Scan" scanner model enables it automatically.
- Yes. The scanner and editor work on Windows, macOS, and Linux with the local server. The PDF compressor requires our compression engine to be installed separately (available free from the official compression engine site). The scanner and editor use our rendering pipeline, which installs automatically and needs no extra software.
Designed for focus
“The best document workflow is the one that gets out of your way.”
No account and no watermark. Your document history lives in your own browser — our servers discard every file once your download is ready.
Make your next document your best one.
Open ScanDrift and get straight to the work.