Free Image Converter - Google Drive

Google Drive is Google's cloud service for saving and backing up images, documents, videos, and other important files. In fact, it's the default WhatsApp backup channel for Android users. But did you know that Google Drive can also translate picture into text? Yes, you can use this cloud service to convert image texts into editable captions, thanks to the inbuilt OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology. So, without dilly-dallying much, let's dive in and see how this image to text converter for Google works.

Part 1. Use Google Drive to Convert Image to Text (OCR)

First, let's learn how to extract text from an image saved on Google Drive. But before we start extracting, note that the image file shouldn't exceed 2MB. Also, the text should be right-side up. Therefore, it's wise to rotate the image before loading it to Google Drive. But don't worry, I'll teach you how to do that later on in this post. Another thing, this method only works on PC. To put it simply, you can't translate a picture into editable text directly on the Google Drive app.

Follow these steps:

Step 1. If you have the picture already uploaded on Google Drive, simply select it. Or, you can upload a new captioned photo by clicking New > File Upload to add the image.

Step 2. Next, right-click the text image, choose Open With, and select Google Doc.

Step 3. Google Drive's free OCR service will begin extracting the image text. You'll see the exact image texts right below the picture. Now edit the texts as you wish. It's that simple and free!

Part 2. Use Google Drive to convert JPG to PDF

Sometimes you may want to convert Google JPG to PDF. That's because converting an image to PDF is the easiest way to view it on MS Word. In other words, you should first encode the image to PDF to view it on MS Word. You can then use this text editor to change the captions and save the new image. Fortunately, Google Drive comes in handy in this case, as well. Below are the detailed steps:

Step 1. Open Google Drive and click the My Drive menu. Then, click My Docs before choosing Blank document.

Step 2. Now insert the photo that you wish to convert to PDF. To do that, click Insert, select Image, and then tap Upload from computer. You can also upload from Google Photos and Google Drive.

Step 3. Click File, choose Download, and select PDF Document (.pdf). This method also allows you to convert images to plain text (.txt) or web page (.html). That's it!

Part 3. How to convert HEIC to JPG on Google Drive

As you may already know, iPad and iPhone capture photos in HEIF format with a .heic filename extension. HIEC is almost half as small compared to JPG and offers better image quality. But back to the article's agenda, HEIC isn't supported on Google Drive. In other words, you'll have to convert the HEIC image to PNG or JPG before converting to text using this cloud service. Another thing, Google Drive doesn't support the convenient batch conversion.

With these two reasons in mind, I recommend using Wondershare UniConverter to convert HEIC to something more universal like PNG or JPG. It's a simple Mac/Win image converter that supports all image formats, including raw files. It's compatible with BMP, PNG, JPG, WebP, TIF, SVG, CUR, PSD, and many more. Before converting, this desktop program lets you retouch the photo with things like effects, watermarks, resizing, cropping, and so on. Moreover, you can even convert HEIC or any other image format to GIF.

Follow these easy steps to convert HEIC to JPG on Wondershare Image Converter:

Install and run UniConverter on your computer, then tap the Toolbox button on the left pane. Now scroll through the available tools and choose Image Converter. When it launches, simply drag and drop your HEIC image on the UI or tap Add Images to browse and upload a local photo.

Do you want to make your HEIC picture more appealing? In that case, click the Effect or Crop buttons on the image thumbnail to launch the editor. Now you can crop the area size of the photo. As said before, Google Drive supports right-side-up photos. So, rotate and flip the image to meet this requirement. You can also adjust the brightness, saturation, contrast, and add watermarks.

Don't stop there; click OK and close the window. Then, tap the Settings icon. You'll see a pop-up window allowing you to resize the pixel dimensions and adjust the image quality. Remember that platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram have the recommended image dimensions to upload.

Are you done editing the photo? If yes, choose JPG or PNG as the output format. You'll also see WebP, TIFF, and BMP options. Lastly, tap Convert to encode HEIC to JPG or PNG with lossless quality. Now that was easy!

Part 4. What is Google Drive?

Google Drive is a cloud storage launched in April 2012. Today, this platform boasts more than 1 billion active users, thanks to its free nature and cross-platform support. You can access files saved on Google Drive on the dedicated mobile app or PC browser. You can open Google Slides, Google Docs, and Google Sheets. Plus, it supports collaborative editing. Just say, you can edit documents for someone living in a different city without resending the file.

Interestingly, free users get up to 15GB of storage to save and edit files on the go. But if this isn't enough for your day-to-day plans, you can upgrade to the 100GB, 200GB, and 2TB paid plans. You can even get 30TB storage for $299.99/month. You can then view images, audio, texts, videos, fonts, presentations; you name it. What's more, Google Drive can convert between most of these files.

Conclusion

I bet you didn't know that Google Drive could do this much. This software can intelligently recognize all image texts and separate them for editing and copying, thanks to the included OCR technology. But to enjoy smooth and quality results, make sure the picture is of high quality. Additionally, use Wondershare UniConverter to convert HEIC to JPG for Google Drive. It's never this easy!