🔎 Fast OCR CLI for Windows: outputs structured data (bounding rects, text) using the local Windows OCR API
- OCR image files or image data from stdin
- Outputs results as JSON (with bounding boxes) or plain text
- Supports multiple languages (default: en-US)
- Fast, local processing (no cloud required)
- Simple CLI interface
- Windows 10/11
- .NET Framework 4.8.1 or later
- Windows OCR API support (built-in on modern Windows)
Download the latest executable from Releases
Or build from source:
git clone https://github.com/Akronae/windows_media_ocr_cli.git
cd windows_media_ocr_cli
dotnet build# OCR from file
windows_media_ocr_cli.exe --file image.png
# OCR from stdin (pipe image data)
type image.png | windows_media_ocr_cli.exe --stdinwindows_media_ocr_cli.exe --file <image> [--language <lang>] [--mode <json|text>]
windows_media_ocr_cli.exe --stdin [--language <lang>] [--mode <json|text>]| Option | Description | Default |
|---|---|---|
| --file | Path to image file | |
| --stdin | Read image data from stdin | false |
| --language | OCR language (e.g. en-US, fr-FR, zh-CN) | en-US |
| --mode | Output format: json (with bounding boxes) or text | json |
- json: Full OCR result, including bounding rectangles and lines/words.
- text: Plain text output (lines joined, no structure).
- Make sure you are running on Windows 10/11 with .NET Framework 4.8.1+ installed.
- If you see errors about missing OCR API, update your Windows system.
- For large images, prefer file input over stdin for performance.
Q: Can I use this on Linux or macOS? A: No, this tool relies on the Windows OCR API.
Q: How do I specify a different language?
A: Use --language <lang>, e.g. --language fr-FR.
Q: What image formats are supported? A: Any format supported by Windows Imaging APIs (PNG, JPEG, BMP, etc).
MIT