How to Use Live Text in photos  on macOS Monterey

Here's a preview of Live Text on macOS Monterey

One of the newest features coming with macOS Monterey this fall is Live Text. Also launching on iOS 15 and iPadOS 15, the feature lets you interact with the text found in any image. For example, text with an address can open in the Maps app, while numbers on an image can become phone digits that you can use in Messages. Once converted, the text is easy to copy/paste just as you would any other text to use elsewhere on your device..

At launch, Live Text will work in images in Preview, Photos, and Safari. It also works with Quick View in Finder. Unfortunately, it won't work in other apps or browsers.

Once macOS Monterey is released, Live Text will be available on all the best Macs, including yours!

 

How to use Live Text on Mac

To interact with Live Text in Preview, Photos, Quick View, or Safari on your computer:

  1. Open the supported app or tool.
  2. Find, then open the image with text.
  3. Highlight the text.
  4. Right-click on the highlighted text to perform different tasks, including Look Up, Translate, and Search With Google.
    • Look Up: provides more information about the text, when possible.
    • Translate: Apple will automatically convert the text in other languages. Use the pull-down to select a language.
    • Search With Google: Allow the search engine to find more information on the copied word.

The following two examples show highlighted Live Text found in photos from a recent trip to Las Vegas, Nevada:

Source: Bryan M. Wolfe / Source: Bryan M. Wolfe 

 

In this example, Live Text is found on a photo found on a webpage in Safari:

Source: Getty Images

Finally, there's an example of text being copied (and pasted in Pages) from an image in the Preview app. Notice that Live Text works even when the characters are small:

 

 

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