Claro ScanPen vs Cloud QR Scanner
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Claro ScanPen
This app allows you to take a photo of printed text and have it read aloud to you instantly. It uses OCR technology to convert images to text and supports multiple languages. It's ideal for students, professionals, and anyone needing auditory access to printed materials, even without an internet connection.
- Photo capture of printed text
- Selectable text for audio playback
- Instant human-quality voice output
- Offline functionality
- Multi-language support
- OCR technology
- Copy and share text
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Need to listen to printed text spoken aloud - at school, in a test or exam, at work or at home? Use Claro ScanPen to photo your printed text document, letter, test paper - then select the text with your finger (or stylus), and hear it spoken straight back to you. Instantly! No internet connection required. Claro ScanPen advances reading aloud support. It gives access to printed text materials and documents for all, in a wide range of languages. Using your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad, simply: • Take a photo of the text or select a photo of the text document from your camera roll. • Highlight with your finger or stylus which section of text you want to hear spoken to you. • Listen as Claro ScanPen instantly reads the text back to you using a human quality voice in a language of your choice. With your finger (or stylus) you can highlight all of the text, word by word or line by line. Tap anywhere to stop the speech. Claro ScanPen can also be used with the built in iOS VoiceOver accessibility feature, allowing low vision and blind users to access text. Claro ScanPen has no access to the internet or any reference material, so is perfect to use as a computer reader under exam and test conditions, helping students who cannot read text very well (e.g. students with dyslexia) to listen to the exam test paper questions and information. It can also be used for quickly converting class handout materials, printed presentations, instructions, books - in fact anything containing printed texts. Great for independent access and learning. Claro ScanPen uses the latest premium Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology to convert your picture into text and uses iOS system voices to read the text back to you. The OCR in Claro ScanPen fully supports the recognition of text in the following languages: • English • Danish • Dutch • French • German • Italian • Norwegian • Portuguese • Spanish • Swedish Simply select the voice that matches the language of your text to hear it read back correctly. Higher-quality Nuance Expressive and Acapela voices are available to purchase in-app. Claro ScanPen is a great addition to the popular Claro Reading and Writing support apps ClaroSpeak and ClaroPDF. Claro ScanPen does not require internet access to function. Explore using the Apple iOS Guided Access feature to lock the iPad, iPod Touch or iPhone into a single app, for more secure and controlled usage. Tap iOS Settings > General > Accessibility > Guided Access to set up Guided Access. Selected text can be copied to the clipboard by enabling the advanced setting in iOS Settings. A share button can be enabled in advanced settings in iOS Settings. This lets you export your image to other apps, email and other destinations. Now supports drag and drop of the scanned text, to apps that support text, such as Notes. Requires iOS 11 and an iPad that supports multi-tasking. *** Minimum camera spec: 2MP *** If you require any product support please email us at support@clarosoftware.com. We cannot respond to any support requests made via the App Store review channel, so please email us first.
Cloud QR Scanner
This educational QR code scanner is designed for schools, offering a distraction-free scanning experience for videos, images, and text. It supports offline access to content and opens web pages in external browsers with your existing add-ons.
- Distraction-free video playback
- Ad-free image and audio display
- Text-to-speech functionality
- Offline content access
- Web page opening in external browsers
- School-optimized interface
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QR Reader optimized for schools. Simple to use, no ads, no in app purchases, no tracking. Cloud QR Scanner is a simplified version of Cloud QR. This version only features the QR reader. If you'd like to create beautiful QR Codes, check out Cloud QR. Some key school friendly features: VIDEO Links to Youtube, Vimeo, etc are presented without link to related videos, social buttons and comments. IMAGE & AUDIO Codes that links to audio or images are presented without distractions. TEXT Texts can be read aloud using the built in voice synthesizer. OFFLINE SUPPORT Codes with text, images, sound and narrated images created with Cloud QR can be made available offline. This enables you to scan them even without an internet connection. WEB PAGES Regular web pages are opened in Safari where your usual addons like AdBlockers and more works.
Screenshots
Verdict
Claro ScanPen and Cloud QR Scanner both sit at 4.2 stars, but that hides the real split: 100% of Cloud QR Scanner's written reviews are positive against 24% of Claro ScanPen's. Cloud QR Scanner also leads on price (Free vs $9.99) and in-app purchases (none vs 11). Claro ScanPen's advantage is ratings volume (148 vs 6). On rating, ads, device support and iOS requirement 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
Cloud QR Scanner is free to download; Claro ScanPen costs $9.99 up front. Claro ScanPen sells 11 one-off in-app purchases. Cloud QR Scanner asks for nothing beyond the download.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.2 for Claro ScanPen against 4.3 for Cloud QR Scanner. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Claro ScanPen has 148 ratings behind it against 6, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews are what separate them: 24% of Claro ScanPen's written reviews are positive against 100% of Cloud QR Scanner's.
Claro ScanPen ships an update every 2 months, Cloud QR Scanner every 3 weeks. The most recent releases landed on October 21, 2026 and October 13, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Claro ScanPen | Cloud QR Scanner |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $9.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 4.2 (148 ratings) | 4.3 (6 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 23.5% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 148 — better | 6 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Every 3 weeks — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Free — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 — better | 14.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 136 MB | 19 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Claro Software Limited | Digitalt Hjarta AB |
Customer experience
Claro ScanPen
Cloud QR Scanner
In-app purchases
Claro ScanPen
- Allison$1.99
- Ava$1.99
- Samantha$1.99
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- Tom$1.99
- Susan$1.99
- Heather$1.99
- Ryan$1.99
- Micah$1.99
- Rod$1.99
- Tyler$1.99
- Will$1.99
Cloud QR Scanner
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is Claro ScanPen free?
Is Cloud QR Scanner free?
Which has better reviews, Claro ScanPen or Cloud QR Scanner?
Do Claro ScanPen or Cloud QR Scanner have ads?
Which is updated more often, Claro ScanPen or Cloud QR Scanner?
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