Microsoft Lens: PDF Scanner Reviews

by Mekaneck84

I’m updating my review but staying with one star. There was an issue where the option to create a text box was disappearing but it has been resolved. The issue I still have, which is more concerning, is that some pictures get stuck in the “transferring” state when trying to save them to OneDrive. You’d expect this to be the most flawless option, since I’m keeping the image in the Microsoft ecosystem. But no, after taking a bunch of inspection photos and uploading them to my OneDrive, I go back to the office to find a few of the thumbnails still showing the “transferring” symbol. In this state you can’t view the picture or re-try. Force close MicrosoftLens , reboot the phone, nothing happens. I left them alone in the state for days, and nothing happened. The only option available was to delete the image. Do I call the customer back and ask them to tear apart their machine again so I can grab the pictures I need? I’m sure if I tell them the Microsoft software I was using is buggy, they’ll happily stop production and take their machine down again for me...

by ColePar

Upon initial installation, MicrosoftLens was my lifeline for college assignments but the more I used it the less functional it became. It started without being able to connect to my OneDrive, and then losing camera functionality altogether and now it won’t even run when I try to start it. Absolutely disappointed with MicrosoftLens at this point

EDIT: I got a developer response so this is my reply, I’m on iPhone 6s Plus on the latest OS. (Not sure what the number is specifically). I have had camera issues in the past so I don’t believe it is your app not being able to open my camera. But when MicrosoftLens does work, it won’t save any PDFs to my one drive. Even if I uninstall and reinstall. Also even when it doesn’t open my camera, I still have the work around of going through to my camera library, but ever since the last update, MicrosoftLens won’t process me clicking the icons and takes forever to even open it. I’ve never had issues with device operation other than the camera being buggy but all my other apps work fine with no lag whatsoever

by Webbgamers

Microsoft Lens used to be great but recently I noticed the name change from Office Lens to Microsoft Lens and the logo changed slightly. I didn't think much of it but every time I use it now it is slow to register the boundaries of papers and updates slowly from slight shaking of the camera. Sometimes it can't even find the paper or had completely wrong boundaries even with good lighting conditions and contrast. The orange preview that shows where it thinks the boundaries are is used for the scaling once the picture is taken even though the preview only updates once or twice per second. It should rescan the boundaries once it takes the picture because it is hard to keep a phone perfectly still from the time when it updates the preview and when you take the picture. Every time I find myself adjusting the edges slightly because a small but significant portion of the surface is showing or the paper is cut off. I want to love MicrosoftLens but after the recent updates I am considering looking for an alternative.

by Mojo Workin

I rarely write review, how ever after using MicrosoftLens for an entire qtr I and totally frustrated and will look for something else. I am required to scan my math home work and submit on line. My math home work regularly goes over 20 hand written pages. I do my my home work in a spiral bound notebook. Every time I try to capture an image the selection box finds the page correctly, and frames the page in portrait as expected, when tap the capture button the image is rotated into landscape. It is very tedious to have to tap several times to get into edit mode so that I can rotate the image back into portrait before capturing the next page

I am required to use pdf, I save to my phone how ever once I export it I can not seem to edit it any more on my phone

If I wait a couple of days and start MicrosoftLens to capture my next assignment for unknow reason the pages wind up on the old document. I waste a lot of time deleting the old home work pages

I expect a lot better from a major office productive app company like micro soft

I have take to just using the iPhone camera and use preview on my Mac to edit and conver to pdf

by DonnaFlorida5

I received a great promo for Lens because I have an office subscription. It made me want to love Lens. But Lens is lacking features that I use all the time when scanning documents. The biggest problem is that it lacks important editing features, such as the ability to change a color document to B/W, and the ability to lighten or darken a document. Second, when I input images from my device (camera roll) into Lens, I must do it one page at a time. I am used to being able to select a number of images at once. (I use that scanner feature frequently to combine PDFs. (I convert the PDFs to images, and then bring the images (PDF pages) into my scanner app and make a new PDF.) Lastly, my old app will capture a page as soon as it detects the edges, without my having to touch the shutter button, but Lens doesn’t. That feature makes it easier to hold the device while scanning and it allows me to scan multiple pages quickly. Lens might offer new functionality for people who want to scan whiteboards. I don’t know and I don’t need that ability. For those of us who deal heavily with documents, Lens needs to step up its game. I can already easily send scans to one note (as an image or a pdf) so switching to Lens would not help me. I will hold off using Lens for now.

by Left Angle

Maybe it’s because my ancient 3 year old iPhone SE updates are interfering; maybe it’s because Microsoft’s updates are making bad things happen, but this once perfect app is no longer so wonderful.
The orange outline disappears the moment the shutter button is pressed and the result is haphazard at best. The image captured may be what the entire viewfinder was showing, a portion of what was outlined the split second before the shot was taken or if you’re lucky, you got what you expected.
It now takes at least 3 or 4 tries to make a usable image and more than once, I’ve discovered too late that an image I thought had covered the entire document was in fact, cut off at some random line of text.

Time for me to start seeking another app. 2 stars because it kinda works... if you’re patient, willing to make several attempts and stay aware.

by Hr...yan

Too complicated to upload files to cloud. No multiple selection of files to share. When scan is finished, next time you open MicrosoftLens , need to cancel previous scan manually, although it has been saved properly.
Orientation is a problem: no manual orientation allowed and the automatic one does not work properly.
Flash-on function does not work stable: after the first manual FLASH-on, you need to tap on flash icon again, although the flash-on is there.
No function to reduce scan size, the scan of 40 pages turns into ~45MB, whereas the scan using conventional scanners gives couple of MBs with the similar quality.
Not possible to scan more than 40 pages.

by Chappighetti

-do a better job of detecting orientation. Sometimes insists on rotating page to landscape. Can’t figure out what’s doing that. So then I have to rotate it post. Which brings me to......
- the touch up icons need to ALL be visible. I’m constantly having to rotate page back to proper orient. But that takes 3!!! Finger taps (not including how many times you rotate.). Once to tap “more” because rotate isn’t visible. Again to tap rotate and AGAINon the view screen so you can get the menu back to where you can select done. Talk about annoying. I’m looking at it right now and you could easily fit all icons AND the done button at same time. It would be so much faster.
- also... for the filters, it needs to remember what filter I last selected. I’m scanning 20 pages, they all need the “none” filter because they were light pencil and subject to clipping. So I have to select the filter EVERY TIME?! Why? And again, that means tap filters, tap none, tap again to get out of the menu so you can hit done.... ugh.

by Hotshot365

I love MicrosoftLens on the whole. It does great with documents and it’s edge detection and document filter are great for making it look nice and not scanned. However, I have two annoyances with MicrosoftLens which usually happen with handwritten notes. 1) MicrosoftLens automatically tries to rotate the paper so the first line is flat. This can make handwritten documents look bad because then whole paper is rotated at a weird angle and makes the left margin at an angle. 2) even in document mode where it makes the paper pure white, if the size isn’t a perfect rectangle it will extrapolate the missing parts in an ugly black and white stripped pattern which looks bad and makes no sense. This problem is further exacerbated by issue one because the extra rotation means there is lots of missing parts in the corners and it looks super bad.

Update: I tried to email the address you replied with but it says it only accepts mail from inside your organization. Is there an email address I can actually use??? Thanks!

by TMF-Mac

This has been my go-to app for some time now, and I ever since I began using it, I became a huge fan and have gotten many friends and colleagues hooked on MicrosoftLens.

It used to be a 5-star app, but over the past few months it has become hit or miss on scanning documents. When in document scan mode, you visually see it detect all the edges properly; however, when you snap the image oftentimes it now cuts off a significant portion! What gives? I have deleted and reloaded MicrosoftLens , updated iOS, reviewed all settings, and it continues to happen.

Previously this worked like magic. I didn't have to be careful of the angle or anything. I could quickly scan any document without fuss and it worked all the time. Sadly it's now less than 50/50 on capturing the entire document (despite it showing the correct edges onscreen). I am truly sad.

by Jeff.B.Apple

Bug 1) I have a personal one drive account and a business related account, I used to be able to have both accounts signed in to choose where the file was uploaded, now MicrosoftLens keeps deleting the business account even when it’s the only account I login to after deleting my personal account (and yes I’ve uninstalled and re-installed)

Bug 2) When opening a file in MicrosoftLens it keeps wanting to open a web browser on my iPhone instead of natively in MicrosoftLens or even via my one drive which is signed into the same account I’m uploading to

Bug 3) In settings there should be an option to set the default scan filters (for example Be able to set the “document” filter for the standard doc, instead of having to select that for every scan)

by Mdaparicio

I really like MicrosoftLens. I've been using it for two years now. First on an Samsung phone, now on a iPhone. I use it everyday to submit assignments for school. There is one thing that I find extremely annoying. When I first got MicrosoftLens on my Samsung new files would just be automatically named what ever the date and time was. This was nice because it meant I never had to name the files and it was easy to figure out when a file was made. When I switched to iOS it worked like this for a little bit, maybe a month or so. But then it broke. Now if I take a scan, the go to the screen where you choose where to save the file to, the will be title is not updated. It shows the title being the date and time of the last time it was updated. The only way I've found to make it update is delete the automaticly set title and leave it blank, it then will title the page correctly. I know that it's just a little bug, but it used to work. I don't remember exactly when this started happening but it was about 8 months ago. Please fix this. It's the only issue with MicrosoftLens that I've encountered.

by Easywater

Everything works well enough for daily uses. I use it to scan and store most paper notes, receipts, documents, magazine clips... Most of the times MicrosoftLens detects the boundaries of the document and automatically crops the scanned image to remove unwanted background. However, sometimes when the contrast between the background and the document is not high enough and/or the light level is low, MicrosoftLens cannot tell where the boundaries are and keeps switching around and snaps on to the wrong boundary lines. I try to move & adjust the phone to different angles & positions to get MicrosoftLens to snap on the correct boundaries but before I can hit the button it switches away to the wrong ones again. If it cannot determine where the correct boundaries are then it should just pick one and allow the user to cycle through the options until he/she finds the correct one. Miscrosoft should add the annotate option after the picture is taken to hi-lite, circle, underline or add a quick note to the scanned image.

by Lovedunicorn

Honestly, over all I really like the application and how it provides the ability to transfer pictures into a pdf format.(which has really helped with school on teams) Recently when saving an image as a pdf and transferring it to OneDrive has not worked. Each time I try it sends me to login to my office350 account and after I login it automatically sends me back. I am not sure if this happens to other people,but I already updated MicrosoftLens and everything so I’m not sure what to do. Please respond to my concerns, due to the fact that I use this for school and it has been the best so far don’t fail me now!😅

by Himmeldonnerwetter

I like MicrosoftLens . Very helpful.
I would like it better if:
1. it allowed to go beyond 100 pages even or allowed to stitch two or three or … PDF documents together into a single one.
2. With whatever setting you took the picture, you can rectify a less than ideal setting by applying a filter before saving. But if you find that most pages would benefit from i.e. the Document or the Enhanced filter (great filter for mixed text / photo pages btw.) then you have to apply them page by page requiring more than one click per page to do so. It would be a great improvement to me if obe had the option to apply a filter either globally, to all pages or to pre-selected pages.

by Chloek200

I have transitioned to online school this quarter and one of my classes needs daily homework and notes turned in in PDF form. I can easily take a picture of my page and export as a PDF file to my onedrive account I already have for school. Since it is automatically on my computer turning in the assignments is then super easy. Also, I trust MicrosoftLens more than the other ones which seem pretty sketchy to me and haven’t worked well for me in the past. Overall, it works well for this weird transition to online and does exactly what I need it to do.

by Apprat0r

For documents/pictures/whiteboards.
I’ve been using office lens for several years now and have been very happy with the flexibility and the accuracy. I’ve tried many scanning apps and stuck with office lens. I have given 5 stars, until the last update. The one thing that took a turn for the worse is the fact that I can’t adjust the borders with a zoomed in view. Previously I was able to pinch-zoom in while adjusting the borders so that I can see exactly where I’m making the border without losing text. With the latest update I’ve lost the ability and need to guess and hope I don’t lose any text. The auto recognition of borders has gotten better, but still is not accurate always. That’s when I want to use the zoom in. Hope the ability gets added back.

by Storm's Other Son

Of the all the receipts I have already scanned and are still finding, although I no longer work where I used to, as far as their reimbursable policy goes, whether the supplies that, were needed I did not put in for, end up being a post employment donation to write off next year come tax time or they cut me a check, this application is so awesome!
Even more awesome is the fact that it is not only for receipts and has different settings for documents, business cards and others!
Impressed - does not do this awesome app justice. Surprised by this additional excellence from Microsoft - not in the least!
Thank you!

by Warthorius

This type of app should make a tedious, frustrating job easier. Office Lens makes it more tedious and more frustrating. Since first installing MicrosoftLens I was always on edge if I will be able to upload a document with dozens of pages. It randomly asks me to sign in again (even when I am already signed in to multiple Microsoft apps on the same device).

Right now I am stuck in a loop where it prompts me to sign in every time I try to upload this document to One Drive, and this is it for me. I am not scanning another 10 pages if I am not sure that I will be able to save them anywhere as a pdf document. This is awfull.

by Xctual

I was actually impressed by MicrosoftLens. I usually use my normal camera to take notes for class, but MicrosoftLens enhances that. The most impressive thing I noticed about MicrosoftLens is how you can easily take a photo from the sides and it straightens it out with no image issues whatsoever. A minor issue I did notice however is that the user would have to manually turn off the Auto setting for the flash for every picture they wish to take. While this might be helpful for lighting in photos, sometimes in certain situations (such as a dark classroom) the flash would not be appreciated by others and forgetting to turn it off might be a little embarrassing. Other than that, MicrosoftLens seems very well made and works as directed. Five stars from me.

by Littlebugs

MicrosoftLens was a life saver when for a whole month intensive course of sight translation from English to Spanish and my prof never gave me a heads up on what text pages to adapt for my print learning disabilities!! I needed to have OCR STAT! Then I was able to easily enlarge the text and spaces between the lines and more!! If it wasn’t down I lost the whole class period of note taking, scribbling in key legal and medical terms that can’t be done with Microsoft nor G translate! Did mention it was a 4 week class vs 16 weeks!?

I went to use it just now, with a text book page of grammar, the Immersive Reading feature distorts the text, and removes bold print of words. PLEASE please help! And I will happily change my stars and review. I am an adult with print and related dyslexia issues.

by CableX1

Downloaded to use the OCR capabilities. No explanation how to use them seems to be available anywhere in MicrosoftLens . I assume you have to save it to Word...which A-HA!!! I can’t do unless I have or create a Microsoft account. I have an account that I used for Skype, but MicrosoftLens won’t take it...maybe it’s not the right account. Dunno, don’t care. So I create a new Microsoft account, but it still won’t take. Created and verified the account, but I go to add it to the connected accounts section, it never adds...just takes me back to the connected accounts section.

About typical for a Microsoft product...works, but the features you really want to use...don’t...and cuz some other unnecessary, idiot feature doesn’t work.

by Bors De Ganis

App works great for scanning documents, but for those of us who have a stack of business cards that we want to scan to Outlook contacts, the process is way too complicated. You can scan the business card to OneNote only and in order to then get it to Outlook you must get to a PC, download the scanned card from OneNote (App or Online) to the PC as a .vcf, then open Outlook and import as a separate file. COME ON MICROSOFT!!!!! Now that Office 365 supposedly allows these office apps to work with each other as never before; it seems being able to scan, save, and import from one Microsoft app to another should be much easier. MicrosoftLens should remove my need to purchase a third-party piece of scanning hardware in order to get business cards into Outlook.

by [iPapi]

Several museums, multiple failures. Can’t render fine brushstrokes or subtle detail of many impressionist paintings (driven crazy by Monet) taken at museums where it’s allowed. Pointillism will come out looking like random clusters of dots separated by big white areas. End up using the regular camera for these. Works fine for others, although the colors tend to look too bright and more exaggeratedly gaudy than in reality. Do not like how it cuts off parts of picture frames willy nilly. If there are more than one flyers posted, it can’t seem to allow you to pick just one to image. Gets confused. MicrosoftLens is nice when it works, but it could use a lot of refinement.

by Fatheroftheyear

MicrosoftLens was a lifesaver for expense receipts when I first started using it a couple years ago. I still use it, but I have 2 major complaints:
1) Using it on an iPhone, MicrosoftLens does not stay logged into my Microsoft account, so almost every time I scan something, I have to retype my password to send to OneNote or OneDrive
2) Saving as PDF or to files is not easily accessible

The above to problems make me look for a new app every month or so, but it still solves my needs better than others. I love how easily I captures docs for work and home. I just get annoyed at the extra steps I need to take because they can’t solve the login issues

by VirtualGus

Office Lens has been one of my favorite apps for a long time. I use it mainly for whiteboard pictures and scan documents and receipts. It worked flawlessly for a long time.
I can’t understand why break something that works great? One of the many updates all of a sudden makes Lens to not auto-detect the correct doc size anymore. 90% of the times it crops it wrong. This used to work perfect everyday. I’ve tried of course with different backgrounds and light conditions and angles so I’m convinced it’s something in MicrosoftLens .
Still a great app but sad to see an app like this to go down from amazing to ok.

by HarutReview

I rely on MicrosoftLens exclusively for PDF conversion and OCR capabilities together with my OneDrive account....

One big functionality missing is ability to choose destination folder when uploading this to cloud and optionally choosing a more descriptive file name...

Alternatively or in addition to choosing destination folder it would be nice to be able to open whatever folder the file has been uploaded to in the native OneDrive app to be able to rename the file or move or copy it to another folder.

by Zullnight

MicrosoftLens is fantastic, use it all the time. Quick, simple, and gives quality results ever time. Even when documents are at an angle and lighting is not what it should be you still get a good result and perspective corrected.

The interface for saving, could be improved, bit confusing to get use to and we’re it is going to be saved. But once learnt it is fine and taking quick scans to default location is simple. Changing names latter, is ok but could be improved UI wise

Still it is very much a 5 star app!!

by George Man22

Update: As promised, I’m updating to 5 stars since magically the ability to delete local scans mysteriously appeared. Thank you.

I like MicrosoftLens. But please tell me what I’m missing, since these questions appear simple and I could not find the answers anywhere.

I save scans to pdf and specify iPhone local storage. Then I send to Dropbox. When I’m done, there does not appear to be a way to delete the PDFs in MicrosoftLens , short of deleting MicrosoftLens and reinstalling. Yes - I tried holding, and swiping every which way. As for where on the iPhone these scans are stored locally, no one seems to know. I’ve looked in Photos, Files and every other location and can’t find where they are stored. This seems a simple question, but Googling this I find others are similarly frustrated.

Am I missing some obvious usage paradigm? I’d give this five stars if I could just delete scans from MicrosoftLens .