Comparison

ScanMate vs Scan Cam PDF

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

ScanMate

Features
Read full description

ScanMate turns your iPhone into a fast, private document scanner — without the ads, watermarks, and subscription traps you're tired of. FREE, AND STAYING FREE • Unlimited scans — no daily limits • No watermark on any export • No ads, anywhere • Automatic edge detection, manual crop with a magnifier • Multi-page and batch scanning • Enhancement filters: Auto, Grayscale, B&W, Color • Sign pages, reuse saved signatures, drop in a date stamp • Expiry reminders for passports, IDs, insurance, and contracts • Export to PDF, JPG, or PNG; share or save to Files • Folders, tags, search, favorites, and Trash • Face ID app lock • Home Screen and Lock Screen widgets, Control Center button, Siri and Shortcuts • Find any scan straight from Spotlight SCANMATE PRO • Offline OCR in more than 15 languages • Search inside your documents • AI naming and document classification • Receipt, invoice, and business-card extraction — save cards to Contacts • Receipt ledger with monthly totals and CSV export • Smart cleanup and background removal • PDF tools: merge, split, reorder, compress • Export to Google Drive, Dropbox, and OneDrive • Unlimited private folders PRIVATE BY DESIGN Everything runs on your iPhone. Scans and text recognition never touch our servers. Documents sync through your own iCloud account — we never see them. Locked documents and private folders never appear in widgets or Spotlight. HONEST PRICING A genuinely useful free tier that stays free. One fair yearly plan, or buy Pro once with Lifetime. No fake countdowns, no surprise trial charges, no dark patterns. Cancel anytime in Settings. Built for students, small businesses, freelancers, accountants, lawyers, real estate agents, teachers, and parents. Scan a receipt, a contract, a whiteboard, or a stack of notes — and get a clean, professional PDF in seconds. — Questions? support@scanmate.app — a real person answers. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://jigsawlab.com/scanmate/privacy.html

About

Scan Cam PDF

Transform your phone into a powerful document scanner. Capture, enhance, and organize your papers with edge detection, shadow removal, and multiple page support. Export to PDF or JPEG, and share your scans securely offline.

Highlights
  • Edge detection and straightening
  • Shadow removal
  • Multi-page document creation
  • Folder organization
  • Searchable documents
  • PDF and JPEG export
  • Offline text recognition
Features
Read full description

Scan Cam turns your iPhone into a document scanner. You photograph a sheet of paper, the app finds its edges, straightens it and cleans up the text: what you get is a real scan, not a photo of a piece of paper. Your documents stay on your iPhone and in your own iCloud Drive — never on a server of ours. No account to create, no adverts, no analytics. The iCloud copy brings your invoices, your contracts and your identity papers back if you reinstall the app or change iPhones, and you can turn it off in the settings. Apart from that copy, a document leaves your phone only on the day you decide to share it yourself. SCANNING • Edges detected and the page straightened, even shot at an angle • Four looks: original photo, colour, greyscale, black and white • Strength adjustable with your finger, with a preview that follows • Shadows removed in one tap, for pages shot under a lamp or a hand • Several pages in one document, to reorder, rotate or remove • Import a photo or a PDF already on your phone: it becomes a document, just like a scan ORGANIZING • Folders and subfolders, like on a computer • A search that also finds what is filed deep inside a folder, and tells you where • Rename, move, duplicate, delete • A copy in your own iCloud Drive: your documents come back after a reinstall or on a new iPhone FINISHING AND SHARING • Export to PDF or JPEG • Add text on a page • Print straight from the app • Save to the Files app, or send through the iPhone's share sheet SCAN CAM PRO The free version is complete and never expires: scan, organize, filter, annotate, print and export to PDF as much as you like. Free PDFs carry a small "Scanned with Scan Cam" line at the foot of the page. The Pro subscription adds: • PDF with no line at the foot • Text recognition, which reads your pages and hands you the text to copy • Signature, drawn with your finger and placed where you want it • Watermark, across the page • Merging several documents into one • Pulling pages out into a new document • Export to Word (.docx) and Excel (.xlsx) Text recognition runs on the phone, with no internet: it reads the Latin alphabet, Japanese, Chinese and Korean. NINE LANGUAGES The app reads in French, English, Spanish, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Japanese, Chinese and Korean. SUBSCRIPTION • Scan Cam Pro — one year, after a 7-day free trial • The price is the one shown by the App Store and in the app, in your own currency • Payment is charged to your Apple account when you confirm the purchase • The subscription renews automatically at the end of each year unless it is cancelled at least 24 hours before that date • You can manage and cancel it at any time in your Apple account settings • Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ • Privacy Policy: https://scancam.app/privacy.html

Screenshots

ScanMate4 screens
Scan Cam PDF4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is iOS requirement: Scan Cam PDF at 15.5 against ScanMate's 18.0. On price, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. ScanMate sells 3 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month and Scan Cam PDF sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $22.99 per year. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

ScanMate ships an update every 2 weeks, Scan Cam PDF weekly. The most recent releases landed on October 11, 2026 and October 14, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard1 real difference · 9 level
ScanMate versus Scan Cam PDF: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterScanMateScan Cam PDF
PriceFreeFree
Rating—5.0 (3 ratings) — better
Positive reviews—100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings—3 — better
Update frequencyEvery 2 weeksWeekly — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesYes
Monetization—Free with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhoneiPhone, iPod — better
Requires iOS18.015.5 — better
Further details — not scored
Size3 MB86 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperiCometPierre Trochet

In-app purchases

3 purchases

ScanMate

Subscriptions2
  • Monthly Scan Mate Membership$4.991 Month
  • Yearly Scan Mate Membership$29.991 Year
One-time1
  • Lifetime Membership Scan Mate$59.99
1 purchases

Scan Cam PDF

Subscriptions1
  • Premium (1 year)7 Days trial$22.991 Year

Questions

Is ScanMate free?
ScanMate is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Scan Cam PDF free?
Scan Cam PDF is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Do ScanMate or Scan Cam PDF have ads?
Neither ScanMate nor Scan Cam PDF shows ads.
Which is updated more often, ScanMate or Scan Cam PDF?
ScanMate ships an update every 2 weeks, and Scan Cam PDF weekly. Most recently, ScanMate was updated on October 11, 2026 and Scan Cam PDF on October 14, 2026.

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