YOU can scan real-world text onto your iPhone in seconds – allowing you to quickly load the content of a menu or newspaper without a scanner.
The “game-changing” trick was highlighted by ex-Apple employee and TikTok star Sabrina Badin in a recent video posted to her 39,000 followers.
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Having apparently once worked as an Apple Genius – the company’s army of customer support staff – she knows a thing or two about its devices.
“Your iPhone is now able to recognise text,” Sabrina, who posts under the username @sabbadz, said.
“It allows you to copy any text on any board and simply paste it on Notes or your messages.”
Called “Live Text”, the tool was rolled worldwide earlier this year with the release of iOS 15, the latest version of the iPhone operating system.
As well as scanning text from real-world documents, the feature can also copy information in photos – such as the writing on a road sign.
You can use it to make a call, send an email or look up directions with just a tap on the highlighted text in a picture or an online image.
What is Live Text?
Live Text allows you to point your iPhone camera at a real world object and quickly copy and paste text on it onto your handset.
It could help you capture notes on a whiteboard at the end of a meeting or school class, or copy down a handwritten note of a family recipe.
It works through the camera app and utilises high-tech artificial intelligence to recognise and scan text in a variety of lighting conditions.
“Today our photos are full of rich and useful information, from photos of places we visit to handwritten notes of family recipes,” Apple said when announcing the feature at its WWDC event in June.
“Live Text unlocks this information in a way that’s really natural.”
How to use Live Text
To use the tool, you’ll need to iOS 15, which is available now to anyone with an iPhone 6S or later, as well as the 7th generation iPod touch.
You can read our guide on how to install iOS 15 below.
Once that’s sorted, grab an object with text you want to scan and open the Camera app on your iPhone.
Point the camera at the object and then tap the indicator that appears in the lower right of your display. It looks like lines of text surrounded by a box.
When you tap it, the text jumps out on your display and you’re given the option, to copy, select, looks up, translate or share it.
You can copy and paste it into an email or Note, for instance, or share it with a friend over WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger.
You can also use Live Text on photos already in your photo library.
Simply open a photo in the gallery app and tap and hold on a piece of text in the picture to select and highlight it.
What is iOS 15 and how do I get it?
Released worldwide on September 20, 2021, iOS 15 is the latest and greatest version of the iPhone operating system.
The update introduced a redesigned home screen and some big changes to Apple’s messaging app, iMessage.
It also includes an updated Lock Screen and a suite of new privacy and notification features.
The headline addition, however, is Focus. The tool lets users set different notification preferences depending on what they’re doing.
You can use the new menu to select if you’re driving, working, sleeping or a custom status of your choosing.
You have the option to select if your phone makes a sound or not, or whether it vibrates, depending on your current status.
Focus will even notify your iMessage contacts of your status to let them know why you’re not responding to their texts.
To download iOS 15, head to Settings > General > Software update.
Never hand your iPhone to someone without doing ‘Album Tap’ trick first
In other news, a 75-year-old Brit has told of his anger after scammers on WhatsApp fooled him into sending them hundreds of pounds.
Google Chrome users are being warned to delete the browser amid fears highly sensitive data is being harvested.
Facebook has announced that it’s changing its name to “Meta”.
The company is working to create lifelike avatars of its users that they can control in a virtual world called the “metaverse”.
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