olmocr vs text-extract-api

Side-by-side comparison of two AI agent tools

Short answer

  • olmocr is growing faster: +413 GitHub stars in the last 30 days vs +17 for text-extract-api.
  • Pick olmocr for: toolkit for linearizing PDFs for LLM datasets/training. Pick text-extract-api for: local FastAPI for OCR extraction and PII removal from images, PDFs and Office files to Markdown or JSON.

From GitHub data refreshed daily.

olmocropen-source

Toolkit for linearizing PDFs for LLM datasets/training

text-extract-apiopen-source

Local FastAPI for OCR extraction and PII removal from images, PDFs and Office files to Markdown or JSON

Metrics

olmocrtext-extract-api
Stars19.7k3.2k
Star velocity /mo413.368421052631516.736842105263158
Commits (90d)00
Releases (6m)00
Downloads (30d, npm + PyPI)17.4K—
Overall score0.34541450037017640.20484123380037875

Pros

  • +Excellent handling of complex document layouts including equations, tables, handwriting, and multi-column formats with natural reading order preservation
  • +Cost-effective processing at under $200 per million pages, making it economical for large-scale dataset creation
  • +Continuous model improvements with recent releases showing significant performance gains and reduced hallucinations on blank documents
  • +完全本地化处理,无外部依赖,确保数据隐私和安全性
  • +支持多种先进OCR策略(LLaMA Vision、EasyOCR等),识别精度极高
  • +集成分布式队列和缓存机制,支持大规模文档批量处理

Cons

  • -Requires GPU resources due to 7B parameter model, making it computationally intensive and potentially expensive to run
  • -May require multiple retries for some documents to achieve optimal results
  • -Limited to image-based document formats (PDF, PNG, JPEG) and requires technical expertise for setup and optimization
  • -需要安装多个依赖组件(Docker、Ollama),初始设置较为复杂
  • -本地运行PyTorch模型需要较大计算资源和存储空间

Use Cases

  • •Converting academic papers and research documents with complex equations and figures for LLM training datasets
  • •Processing legacy document archives with multi-column layouts and mixed content types into searchable text format
  • •Creating high-quality training data from technical manuals, textbooks, and scientific publications for domain-specific language models
  • •医疗机构将MRI报告、病历等医疗文档转换为结构化数据
  • •企业财务部门处理发票、合同等文档并自动移除敏感信息
  • •法律机构批量数字化和分析大量合规文档或法律条文

FAQ

Which is more popular, olmocr or text-extract-api?
olmocr has more GitHub stars (19,687 vs 3,183).
Which is more actively developed, olmocr or text-extract-api?
olmocr had more commits in the last 90 days (0 vs 0).
Should I use olmocr or text-extract-api?
Compare their capabilities, limitations and "best for" notes above. Both are open source, so trying each on a small task is the fastest way to decide.