# Scan a score

Capture paper pages with the camera and add them to My Library as a cleaned PDF score.

> Type: How-to · Status: Stable · Platforms: iPadOS 17+, iPadOS 17+ · Last reviewed: 2026-07-18

`Scan a score` turns paper pages into a PDF score in `My Library`. Capture uses the iOS document scanner — live edge detection, automatic capture, and perspective correction — and Page Turner then straightens each page and cleans it to sharp black-on-white. Capture and cleanup both run on the device.

## Scan the pages

Before you start, place the score flat on an evenly lit surface. Avoid shadows across the staves, glare, and fingers holding pages down — the cleanup pass cannot recover what the camera didn't capture clearly.

1. In the library, open `Add score` (the `+` button) and select `Scan a score`. On iPhone, the same action is its own `+` button next to the search field.
2. The first time, Page Turner shows the `Better scans with the flash` tip; select `Open scanner`. In low light, turn on the flash with the control at the top of the scanner — an evenly lit page scans sharper.
3. Allow camera access if iOS asks. If you declined earlier, re-enable it in the iOS Settings app — see [Permissions](/docs/start/permissions).
4. Hold the device parallel to the page. The scanner finds the page edges and captures each page automatically; scan pages in playing order.
5. Retake or remove pages with the scanner's own controls, then finish the scan.

When the scanner closes, an `Importing your score…` overlay reports the cleanup page by page (`Cleaning up page 2 of 6`), and the score then opens directly in the reader. Cleanup is all-or-nothing for the whole scan: if it cannot run — an unreadable capture, more than 80 pages, or a file that cannot be written — the score imports with the raw camera capture on every page rather than failing. Where the scanner cannot find the page edges, that page is still cleaned, only not straightened. Cancelling inside the scanner imports nothing.

> **Note** `Scan a score` only appears in the `Add score` menu on devices with a camera the scanner can use.

## Title and composer

Once the score opens in the reader, the `Suggested metadata` sheet appears over it — this is where the title and composer are set, not later in `My Library`. Page Turner reads the first page with on-device text recognition: the largest text near the top is proposed as the title, and the top of the page is checked for a composer and an opus or catalogue number (for example `Op. 69 No. 1`). Choose `Apply` to accept the proposal, `Edit` to correct it first, or `Skip` to keep the name the scan imported with. When the reading is weak, nothing is applied silently — the sheet asks you to type the title and composer instead. Corrections later go through Properties; see [Score metadata](/docs/library/metadata).

A scan always lands as its own library entry, even when a piece with a matching title already exists — it is never silently merged away. If the sheet detects a likely match, it asks whether to add the scan as a version of that piece instead; select `Add as version of` the named piece to attach it, or ignore the suggestion to keep a separate entry.

## Clean up the result

If page order, framing, or cleanup needs work, open `Edit This Score` in the reader's toolbox:

- `Rearrange pages` — reorder, rotate, duplicate, or delete pages.
- `Crop` — trim the page framing.
- `Dewarp & Clean` — re-run the straighten-and-clean pass with a `Before`/`After` preview, for captures the automatic pass didn't fully fix. Applying it saves the result as a new version; the original pages are kept.

See [Edit and export a score](/docs/reader/edit-export).

> **Note** A scan is readable page material, not editable notation. For notation-aware features — analysis, fingering, following — run `Convert to Smart Score` from the same `Edit This Score` menu; see [Convert a PDF to Smart Score](/docs/smart-score/convert).

> **Limit** Cleanup is capped at 80 pages per PDF. A longer scan imports with the raw camera capture, and `Dewarp & Clean` asks you to split the PDF and process the parts separately.

> **Limit** The camera cannot restore music that is outside the frame, obscured, or unreadable on the paper. Check page order and notation against the original before rehearsal or performance.