NAPS2 vs Nostalgia
NAPS2
naps2.com
Nostalgia
getnostalgia.aiSide by side
| Figure | NAPS2 | Nostalgia |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $6.67/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | — |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | — |
| iOS | — | Yes |
| Android | — | Yes |
| API | Yes | — |
| Plans published | 2 | 6 |
| Spec score · Photo Scanning Software | 8.6 (#5) | 8.2 (#11) |
| Platforms | The latest NAPS2 release is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux; the current Mac version requires macOS 12 or later and current Windows versions support Windows 10 and 11. | The site says web and iPhone/iPad are available, Android is in Google Play testing, and a Mac beta supports compatible scanners. |
| Purpose | NAPS2 is free, open source scanning software for scanning documents and saving them as PDF, TIFF, JPEG, or PNG. | Nostalgia helps families scan, restore, organize, and privately share old family photographs with their stories. |
| Security | Scanner sharing uses HTTPS with an automatically generated self-signed certificate by default, may fall back to HTTP, and can be configured to require HTTPS or use a custom certificate. | The privacy policy says Nostalgia uses encryption in transit (TLS), encryption at rest, and access controls. |
| Support | Users can file a support ticket and attach NAPS2 error logs to help diagnose a problem or report a bug. | The support page says replies typically arrive within one business day and lists help for restoration, account, billing, and privacy issues. |
Plans
Nostalgia
- FreeFree
- Family (monthly)$7.99 a month
- 50 credits$9.99, paid once
- 200 credits$24.99, paid once
- 500 credits$49.99, paid once
- Family (yearly)$79.99 a year
In their own words
NAPS2
NAPS2 is free, open-source software for scanning documents and saving them as PDF, TIFF, JPEG, or PNG. It runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux, and supports WIA and TWAIN drivers with flatbed or automatic document feeder scanners, including duplex scanning. Users can reorder, interleave, rotate, crop, deskew, and adjust scanned pages’ brightness and contrast. OCR makes scans searchable, supports more than 100 languages, and can add text recognition to imported PDFs. NAPS2 can share scanners across a local network using ESCL, including with compatible Android and iPhone apps, but it must remain running on the server for sharing to work. It can send email through Gmail and Outlook, with the email address and secure sending token kept on the user’s computer and sent only to the relevant provider. Optional developer tools include a command-line interface for automation and a .NET scanning library. The free plan has no ads or restrictions, though OCR results cannot be saved directly to a text file.
Nostalgia
Nostalgia helps families scan, restore, organize, and share old photographs together with their stories. Its tools include repair, deglare, denoising, enhancement, optional colorization, background removal, and animation. Photo Insight checks an image and recommends a restoration step before one is applied. The archive can keep source photos and restored versions with people, captions, notes, dates, and places. Family-tree import can connect people in photos with relatives, and relatives can answer shared photo questions without accounts; the account holder reviews replies before adding them. Prints can be scanned by phone, while the Mac beta supports compatible flatbed scanners. Nostalgia is available on web, macOS, iOS, and Android. The free plan includes 10 restores per month and 30 welcome restores, with one restore used for each cloud repair pass. Family costs $7.99 a month and includes 60 restores monthly, 50 GB storage, and batch restoration for up to 100 photos. The maker says uploaded photos and restoration results are not used to train AI without separate explicit consent.