The Notes app on the iPhone has a powerful document scanning feature built into it, and today I learned that this scanner can be controlled directly from a paired Mac in a variety of applications. It is an incredibly useful tip for Mac users, as it eliminates the annoying intermediate steps of having to transfer it from the phone to the computer or get it from the Mac Notes application after syncing. Scream at the TikTok account @keyboardshortcuts for drawing my attention to this.
In addition to Notes, the iPhone scanner can be accessed from several different Mac applications, including Finder, Mail, Messages and Pages 7.2 and later. To use it, right-click (or right-click) the window to which you want to scan the document, select “Import from iPhone or iPad” and click “Scan documents”. The camera app will magically open on the linked mobile device, where a scan can be done as usual – no need for wires. Once this is done, the scanned document will go to the Mac application with minimal hassle. I found it useful to scan several legacy documents directly into a new folder in the Finder, for example.
According to a support page for the feature, the Mac will need to run macOS Mojave or higher, and the iPhone or iPad will need to run iOS 12 or higher. Both devices must have Wi-Fi and Bluetooth enabled and connected to iCloud with the same Apple ID with two-factor authentication enabled.
In addition to scanning documents, the feature can also be used to take photos. Just select “Take photo” instead of “Scan documents” in the menu and touch the shutter button on your mobile device to capture an image.
Camera Continuity is not a new feature, but its compatibility with the iPhone’s document scanner was new to me.