Microsoft Lens (earlier called Office Lens) is a small, handy app that turns your phone camera into a scanner. You can take photos of documents, receipts, whiteboards, business cards and the app will crop, clean up, and save them as PDF, Word, PowerPoint or image files. It also has built-in OCR (text recognition) so you can extract printed — and in many cases handwritten — text to copy and edit.
Below I explain what Lens can do, how to use its main features, and a recent important change from Microsoft that every user should know.
What Microsoft Lens does (in simple words)
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Scan and clean images: Point the camera, tap the shutter and Lens will detect page borders, correct perspective and improve readability (so photos of documents look like scanned pages).
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Save in many formats: After scanning you can save the result as a PDF, or export it to Word, PowerPoint, or Excel — the exported Word/PowerPoint files are real, editable Office files. You can also save locally or to OneDrive/OneNote. (Google Play)
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Optical Character Recognition (OCR): Lens can extract printed text and often handwriting, letting you copy text from images into other apps. This makes receipts, notes, or whiteboard photos searchable and editable.
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Special modes: Whiteboard, Document, Photo and Action modes (Actions include Text, Table extraction, Read (Immersive Reader), Contact from business card, and QR code scanning). These modes optimise the capture and follow-up actions.
Why people liked Microsoft Lens
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Fast and free: Simple UI — open, point, scan — and most core features were free. (Google Play)
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Good integration with Microsoft services: Save scans straight to OneNote or OneDrive and open them later from your computer. That made organization easy for students and professionals. (Microsoft Support)
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Handwriting and table extraction: Useful for teachers, students and meetings — you could capture whiteboard notes or printed tables and extract them into editable formats.
How to use Microsoft Lens — quick steps
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Open the app and give camera and storage permission.
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Choose a mode (Document for pages, Whiteboard for boards, Business Card for contacts, or Actions for OCR/QR).
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Frame the page — Lens will automatically detect borders. Tap the shutter.
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Review: crop, rotate, or adjust brightness if needed.
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Save or export: choose PDF, Word, PowerPoint, image or save to OneDrive/OneNote. You can also copy extracted text. (Microsoft Support)
Important recent news: Microsoft is retiring Lens (what that means)
Microsoft announced a phased retirement of the standalone Lens mobile app. The company started the retirement phase on September 15, 2025, and planned to remove the app from app stores (so new downloads stop) by November 15, 2025. After December 15, 2025, the app’s ability to create new scans will be disabled, though existing scans will remain accessible for a while. Microsoft is moving many scanning features into its Microsoft 365 and Copilot experiences instead. (Microsoft Support)
What you should do if you use Lens
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Back up your scans now. Save any important PDFs or Word files to OneDrive, local storage, or another cloud drive so you don’t lose access. The retirement timeline means new scans will eventually stop being created in the app. (Microsoft Support)
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Try Microsoft 365 Copilot and Office apps: Microsoft points users to Copilot and the integrated Office mobile apps for scanning features. However, note that some Lens features (for example, direct OneNote export, certain read-aloud or Immersive Reader integrations, and business-card contact flow) may be missing or different in Copilot today. Users have reported feature gaps. (TechRadar)
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Explore alternatives: If you rely heavily on specific Lens workflows (like business card scanning or certain OCR languages), check scanner apps such as Adobe Scan, Google Drive scan, CamScanner, or dedicated OCR tools — and test that they meet your needs before Lens is fully retired.
Pros and cons — short summary
Pros
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Quick, accurate (most of the time) scanning and border detection.
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Strong Microsoft integration (OneNote, OneDrive, Word/PowerPoint exports). (Microsoft Support)
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Good OCR and table extraction features for many languages.
Cons
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Some advanced features tied to Microsoft services; changes in product strategy mean the standalone app is no longer a long-term Microsoft focus. (TechRadar)
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With retirement, users must move to other apps or new Microsoft workflows.
Practical tips (so your scans stay useful)
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Always check the exported Word/PDF for layout and OCR errors — quick fixes avoid headaches later.
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Use good lighting and steady hands for better OCR results — the camera and mode help, but the clearer the image the better the text extraction.
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Organize with folders right after saving (OneDrive or locally) so you can find documents quickly.
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Export important contacts (from business cards) to your phone contacts right away — don’t leave them only inside the app.
Final thoughts
Microsoft Lens was a lightweight, powerful scanner in your pocket. Its tight Office integration and OCR made it a favorite for students, teachers, and office workers. But with Microsoft shifting functionality into Copilot and the Office mobile ecosystem, the standalone Lens app is being retired — so if you depend on it, back up your data now and start testing alternatives or Microsoft’s new tools. For many users, the scanning basics remain simple: point, scan, save — and with a little preparation you can move your workflow without losing data or functionality.