Restore Scanned Photo — Fix Scan Artifacts and Enhance Quality

Restore scanned photos that suffer from scanning artifacts — moire patterns, dust spots, scan lines, color casts, and resolution limits. AI identifies and removes scan-specific issues while enhancing the underlying photo quality.

Process Scanned Photo Free Free SVG workspace

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01
Open your file
PNG, JPG, WebP, AVIF, GIF, or BMP up to 10 MB in the free workspace (the AI converter takes PNG, JPG, WebP, or AVIF). Existing SVGs can be edited in the free workspace.
02
Trace and inspect
Preview the shapes and colors. Clear logos and flat artwork usually trace more predictably than photos.
03
Make it yours
Edit the SVG, compare optional optimization, and download your result.

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May reduce visible scratches and stains

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Upload a PNG, JPEG, or WebP file and download the result when processing finishes. Nothing to install.

Source-dependent color adjustment

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Download the result without a watermark, then check it before you use it. Results depend on the source image.

JPG, PNG, and WebP input

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After processing, use our other AI tools — upscaling, restoration, vectorization — all in one platform with shared credits.

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Process Scanned Photo files directly
May reduce visible scratches and stains
Source-dependent color adjustment
May enhance visible facial detail
Noise and grain reduction
JPG, PNG, and WebP input
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Works in any modern browser
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1 free credit after you verify your email

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Local tracing and SVG editing need no credits. AI conversion includes one credit after email verification; additional packs start at $9.99.

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Scanner-Specific Artifacts and How They Differ from Digital Photo Problems

Scanned photos have a unique set of quality problems that digital photos never encounter. The most distinctive is moire patterns — a wavy, rainbow-like interference pattern that appears when a scanner's sensor grid interacts with the halftone dot pattern used in printed photographs. This is especially severe when scanning photos from newspapers, magazines, and some older photo prints that were made using halftone printing. The moire pattern is not in the original photo; it is created by the scanning process itself.

Physical damage is the other category of scanner-specific problems. Dust particles on the scanner glass or the photo surface appear as white or dark spots. Scratches on the photo show as thin lines. Fingerprints create smudged areas. Creases and fold marks show as sharp lines with color shifts. Yellowing from age adds a warm color cast to the entire image. Water damage can cause spots, staining, or areas of lost emulsion. None of these exist in digital photos — they are physical-world artifacts captured by the scanning process.

Scanner hardware also introduces its own limitations. Flatbed scanners have a fixed optical resolution (typically 300-4800 DPI for consumer models), and scanning above this native resolution just interpolates data rather than capturing real detail. CIS (Contact Image Sensor) scanners are thinner and cheaper but produce less sharp results than CCD scanners. Scanning with the lid open (for thick books or framed photos) can introduce light leaks and uneven illumination. Each of these scanner-specific issues requires different AI processing strategies than digital photo enhancement.

Pro Tips for Better Results

Scan at the highest optical resolution your scanner supports

Before scanning, check your scanner's native optical resolution (not interpolated). Scan at this maximum optical DPI — typically 600 or 1200 DPI for consumer flatbed scanners. Scanning at higher "interpolated" resolutions adds no real detail and just increases file size. Our AI can upscale a clean 600 DPI scan more effectively than it can fix a noisy 2400 DPI interpolated scan.

Clean the scanner glass and the photo before scanning

Use a microfiber cloth on the scanner glass and gently blow compressed air on the photo surface. Every dust particle and fingerprint on either surface becomes a permanent artifact in the scan. Spending 30 seconds cleaning before scanning saves significant restoration effort afterward.

Scan printed photos (newspapers, magazines) at an angle if possible

Moire patterns occur because the scanner's sampling grid aligns with the halftone dot grid of the print. Rotating the photo 15-30 degrees on the scanner bed can break this alignment and dramatically reduce moire. You can rotate the image back to straight in any editor after scanning.

Save scans as TIFF or PNG, not JPEG

Scanned photos already have quality issues — adding JPEG compression on top introduces additional artifacts that make restoration harder. Save your raw scans as TIFF (best) or PNG (good). If you already have JPEG scans, upload them as-is — the AI handles both scan artifacts and JPEG artifacts, but starting with a lossless scan format gives better results.

Why Moire Patterns Appear in Scanned Photos and How AI Removes Them

Moire patterns are an aliasing artifact caused by two overlapping periodic patterns interfering with each other. In scanned photos, the first pattern is the halftone dot screen used to print the original photo (typically 85-150 lines per inch for magazines and newspapers), and the second is the scanner's CCD or CIS sensor array. When the spatial frequencies of these two patterns interact, they create a low-frequency interference pattern visible as colored waves or diamond shapes. Traditional moire removal uses frequency-domain filtering (notch filters in the Fourier transform to suppress the halftone frequency), but this can also remove real image detail at those frequencies. Our AI approach is superior because it learns to distinguish moire patterns from real image content using contextual understanding — it knows that the wavy color bands in a sky region are moire (because skies are smooth) while preserving similarly-frequency detail in textured regions like fabric or foliage.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Scanning at 72 or 150 DPI to save disk space

Low-DPI scans capture far less detail from the original photo than it actually contains. A 4x6 inch print scanned at 150 DPI produces only a 600x900 pixel image — smaller than most smartphone screens. Scan at 600 DPI minimum (producing 2400x3600 pixels from a 4x6 print), which gives the AI enough data to restore effectively and produces a file suitable for reprinting at the original size or larger.

Using the scanner's auto-enhancement features before uploading

Many scanner software packages include built-in "enhance," "sharpen," or "descreening" features. These often do more harm than good — they bake in adjustments that conflict with AI restoration. Scan with all enhancement turned off (raw mode if available) and let our AI handle the restoration with full access to the unmodified scan data.

Scanning a photo through glass (in a frame) without removing it

The frame glass adds an extra reflective surface that can cause glare, reduce sharpness (the photo is no longer flat against the scanner glass), and introduce Newton ring interference patterns. Remove photos from frames before scanning unless the photo is permanently mounted or too fragile to handle. If you must scan through glass, use a scanner with a matte pressure pad, not a glossy one.