Power Automate workflow · PDF & documents

Turn scanned PDFs into searchable PDFs automatically (OCR)

Anything dropped into a 'Scans' folder is OCR'd with Adobe PDF Services and saved as a searchable PDF that Microsoft Search and Copilot can read.

TriggerSharePoint — When a file is created in a folder (folder: Scans/Inbox)
ConnectorsSharePoint · Adobe PDF Services
CategoryPDF & documents

The problem

Years of scanned documents are just images — search, Copilot and eDiscovery can't find anything inside them.

The outcome

Every scan becomes searchable text within minutes, so Microsoft 365 Copilot and SharePoint search can actually use it.

Before you start

  • Adobe PDF Services API credentials (free tier for testing; enterprise plan for volume).

Build it step by step

  1. Trigger on new scan — Fire for PDFs and images only.
    Expression / setting
    @or(endsWith(triggerOutputs()?['body/{FilenameWithExtension}'], '.pdf'), endsWith(triggerOutputs()?['body/{FilenameWithExtension}'], '.tif'))
  2. Get content — Get file content.
  3. OCR — Adobe PDF Services OCR PDF (choose 'searchable image' to keep the original look). Images are first converted with Create PDF.
  4. Compress — Optionally Compress PDF to keep library storage down.
  5. Save and tidy — Create file in Scans/Searchable with the same name, copy metadata, then delete or move the original.

Connector action names are shown as they appear in Power Automate at the time of writing; Microsoft and Adobe occasionally rename actions or add new versions.

Error handling

  • Large scans can exceed connector payload limits (around 100 MB per message) — split very large files first.

Licensing

  • Adobe PDF Services per transaction. Check whether the connector is premium in your tenant.

Variations

  • Run a one-off backfill flow over an existing archive using Get files (properties only) with pagination.

Common in: Government · Legal · Healthcare