OCRMyScreen

OCRMyScreen is a small, focused utility that lets you capture text from anywhere on your screen, especially in places where normal copy-paste simply does not work. Instead of retyping error messages, one-time codes, or text inside images and locked UIs, you press a button, drag over the area, and the app turns that screenshot into editable text on your clipboard. You get a simple, predictable workflow, press "Take Screenshot", select the region, paste the result. For convenience, the app can also keep a text history so you can recover something you copied earlier without having to screenshot it again.

This was honestly something that I just had to build (yes this definitely is not the first of its kind) but has quickly become one those tools you leave running all the time. I use it to grab log messages from stubborn installers, copy chat text from apps that disable selection, pull annoyingly long 2fa codes, sometimes even copy text from screenshots people send me. In most cases it’s faster to just open up OCRMyScreen than to fight with whatever app is blocking selection.

If you want more control, there is a straightforward config file where you can change the OCR language, tweak DPI for better accuracy, adjust page segmentation, or add additional language data. If you don’t care about fine-tuning, you can ignore all of that and just use the default “screenshot to text” behavior. The aim is to stay lightweight and reliable, so when you inevitably run into an unselectable block of text, you already have a tool ready that solves the problem in a couple of seconds.

If you run into or encounter any annoying bugs or problems that prevent the app from working properly I encourage you to report them promptly so this doesn't have to affect more people. For that purpose you can visit the website or contact me by email.