Apps for Blind and Visually Impaired People

The main apps for blind and visually impaired people do a few jobs: getting a description of what's in front of the camera, reading printed text, getting around, and identifying money. For descriptions, Be My Eyes connects you with sighted volunteers on live video and also has an AI that describes photos, and Microsoft's Seeing AI reads text and describes scenes. Both are free on iPhone and Android. Google's Lookout does a similar job on Android, also at no cost. When you want a trained professional instead, Aira charges for minutes but includes free ones.

Below: what each app does, which phones it runs on, what it costs and who it suits, plus what's already built into your phone. Prices and store listings were checked on October 28, 2026.

Key points

• Free: Be My Eyes (volunteers plus Be My AI), Seeing AI and Envision run on iPhone and Android at no charge. Lookout is free on Android only.
• For long reading: Voice Dream ($4.99 a month or from $39.99 a year) and OneStep Reader, formerly KNFB Reader ($99.99).
• For getting around: BlindSquare ($39.99, iPhone), NaviLens (free), and the walking features in Google Maps and Apple Maps.
• Your phone already does a lot. VoiceOver and TalkBack are built in, and newer iPhones and Pixels can describe what the camera sees.
• None of these replaces a cane, a guide dog or mobility training. Apple and Google both say not to use their camera features for navigation.

Apps for blind people at a glance

Volunteers, AI or a professional: three ways to get sighted help

Apps that describe the world work in three ways, and the difference matters more than the brand:

AI answers instantly, without another person looking through your camera. It can be wrong, though, and it can sound sure of itself when it is. A volunteer is a real person who can ask you to move the camera, but you are showing a stranger your surroundings, so keep mail, cards and screens with personal details out of view. A professional agent is trained for this work, and Aira describes its service as HIPAA-compliant, which can matter for tasks like paperwork or a trip through an airport.

Describing the world: Be My Eyes, Seeing AI, Lookout, Envision and Aira

Be My Eyes and Be My AI

What it does: Be My Eyes connects you with a sighted volunteer through a live video call: you point your phone's camera and the volunteer tells you what they see. Volunteers answer around the clock and speak 185 languages, according to its App Store listing. On October 28, 2026, the counter on its website showed more than 11.5 million volunteers and about 1.1 million blind and low-vision users.

Be My AI is the AI assistant inside the same app. You take or share a photo, it describes it, and you can ask follow-up questions. It works when you're signed in as a blind or low-vision user and supports 36 languages. The app also has a directory of companies you can call for help with their products.

• Phones: iPhone (iOS 15 or later) and Android.
• Price: free. The App Store listing says "Always free of charge."
• Who it suits: almost everyone. It's the natural first app to install: a person and an AI in one place.

Seeing AI

What it does: Microsoft's Seeing AI uses the camera to read and describe. It's organized in channels: Read (short text, documents and handwriting, with the option to ask questions about a document), Describe (a scene or photo, which you can explore by touch), Products (barcodes, with beeps to help you find them), People, Currency, Find My Things, Colors and Light. It can also describe photos from other apps.

• Phones: iPhone (iOS 15 or later, 19 languages) and Android.
• Price: free.
• Who it suits: people who want one AI app for quick reading and identifying, without calling anyone.

Google Lookout (Android)

What it does: Lookout is Google's camera app for blind and low-vision people. It has seven modes: Text, Documents (including handwriting), Explore, Currency (US dollars, euros and Indian rupees), Food labels (in 20+ countries), Find (doors, bathrooms, cups or vehicles) and Images, which describes a photo and answers questions about it in English.

• Phones: Android only (Android 6 or later, with at least 2 GB of RAM recommended).
• Price: free to install from Google Play, with no price or in-app purchases listed.
• Who it suits: Android users, especially for food labels.

Envision

What it does: the Envision app reads text in over 60 languages, including handwriting, scans several pages in a row, reads barcodes, describes scenes, and helps you find objects and people. Ask Envision lets you ask questions about text or a scene you've captured.

• Phones: iPhone (iOS 16.6 or later) and Android, with full TalkBack support according to its Play listing.
• Price: free. Envision also sells smart glasses separately, which this guide doesn't cover.
• Who it suits: people who read text in many languages, or who want a second opinion on another app's reading.

Aira

What it does: Aira connects you with trained, paid "Visual Interpreters" on live video, 24 hours a day with no reservation. Calls can run through the phone app, a computer or Meta's AI glasses for hands-free help. The app also includes Access AI, a free AI image chat, and Aira Verify, a free confirmation of that AI description by an interpreter.

• Phones: iPhone and Android.
• Price: the app is free, with 60 free minutes in your first month after your first call and a free five-minute call every day, per its store listings. Calls are also free at Access Partner locations such as Walmart, Starbucks, Target and more than 50 airports. Paid plans start at $26 a month for 20 minutes and go up to $1,160 for 880 minutes.
• Who it suits: people who want a trained professional for longer or more sensitive tasks, like travel, paperwork or a job search.

Reading text and documents

Seeing AI, Lookout and Envision all read printed text from the camera, and Be My AI can read a photo of a page. For longer reading, two paid apps are built for the job.

Voice Dream

What it does: Voice Dream reads documents aloud: PDF, Word, PowerPoint, DRM-free EPUB books, web articles and Google Docs. It has a built-in scanner for printed pages in Latin-alphabet languages, and its listing says it is "Optimized for VoiceOver, Braille and switch control."

• Phones: iPhone and iPad, plus Mac, Apple Watch and Vision. We found no Android version.
• Price: a subscription is required. On the App Store it costs $4.99 a month, or $39.99, $59.99 or $79.99 a year depending on the tier, with a free trial for new users.
• Who it suits: students, professionals and avid readers who listen to long documents and books every day.

OneStep Reader (formerly KNFB Reader)

What it does: OneStep Reader is the app that used to be called KNFB Reader. You photograph a printed page and it reads it aloud, or sends the text to a connected braille display. It can also import PDF, JPEG and ePub files and process a batch of pages.

• Phones: iPhone. We found no current Android version.
• Price: $99.99, one-time, on the App Store.
• Who it suits: people who scan a lot of print, like mail or books. If you read with a braille display, our guide to refreshable braille displays explains how they connect to a phone.

Getting around

These apps add information on top of your travel skills. They don't detect obstacles.

BlindSquare

What it does: BlindSquare uses GPS and the compass to tell you what's around you as you walk: places, street crossings and your direction, using data from Foursquare and OpenStreetMap. It gives directions by the clock face ("at 2 o'clock") and hands off to apps like Apple Maps for turn-by-turn routes.

• Phones: iPhone.
• Price: $39.99 on the App Store. Voice commands use credits sold as an in-app purchase.
• Who it suits: confident travelers who want to know what they're passing and where the next intersection is.

NaviLens

What it does: NaviLens reads special tags, similar in idea to QR codes, that transit agencies and buildings put on signs. The app picks them up from as far as 100 feet away, at a wide angle, without having to aim precisely, and even while you're moving. It's in use in more than 30 countries, including at New York's Jay St–MetroTech subway station, on Barcelona's transit network and at Madrid's Atocha station.

• Phones: iPhone and Android.
• Price: free.
• Who it suits: anyone whose transit system or buildings use NaviLens tags.

Google Maps

Google Maps works with VoiceOver and TalkBack. Two features matter most:

• Detailed voice guidance for walking routes gives extra announcements, such as the distance to your next turn. Turn it on in Settings › Navigation › Walking options › Detailed voice guidance.
• Lens in Maps with your screen reader on lets you point the camera at the street to hear about the places around you. It doesn't work on tablets.

Google Maps is free on iPhone and Android.

Apple Maps with VoiceOver

With VoiceOver on, Apple Maps can speak street names and points of interest as you approach them, and guides you to the start of walking directions with sounds and haptics. A three-finger tap tells you about nearby places. Apple Maps comes with the iPhone.

Money and colors

Bills:

• Seeing AI has a Currency channel, and Lookout has a Currency mode for US dollars, euros and Indian rupees.
• Cash Reader identifies banknotes in more than 100 currencies, works offline and can signal the value with vibration patterns. It's free for lower denominations on iPhone and Android. On iPhone, the full version costs $1.99 a month, $11.99 a year or $39.99 for life, with a 14-day free trial. It needs iOS 18 or later.
• EyeNote, from the US Bureau of Engraving and Printing, identifies US bills from Series 1996 on, by voice, beeps or vibration, offline, in English or Spanish. It's free on iPhone. It doesn't check whether a bill is real.

Colors and light:

• Seeing AI has a Colors channel, plus a Light channel that plays a tone matching the brightness around you.
• Envision's Play listing says it can detect the color of clothes, walls and books.
• On Android, Guided Vision in Gemini Live (more on it below) can tell you about the color and pattern of clothing.

Built into your phone

Check what your phone already does before installing anything. VoiceOver on iPhone and TalkBack on Android read the screen aloud and are free and built in. Our guide to screen readers for the blind covers them in depth.

iPhone

• Magnifier enlarges what the camera sees. With Apple Intelligence (iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 16 or later), Ask Magnifier answers questions about what the camera sees.
• Detection Mode in Magnifier gives live descriptions of what the camera sees. On every iPhone it can detect text and read aloud the text you point at with your finger. On Pro models with a LiDAR Scanner (iPhone 12 Pro through iPhone 18 Pro), it also detects doors, people and furniture. Apple warns not to rely on it in high-risk situations or for navigation.
• Live Recognition brings those descriptions to any screen when VoiceOver is on: triple-tap the screen with four fingers to turn it on or off.
• VoiceOver Recognition describes images and buttons in apps and websites that weren't labeled for accessibility.
• Braille: you can type braille on the screen and connect a braille display. See braille on iPhone.

Android

• The Android Accessibility Suite includes TalkBack, with an on-screen braille keyboard, plus Select to Speak, which reads aloud what you select. See braille on Android.
• Guided Frame in the Pixel Camera app (Pixel 6 and later) helps you frame photos with voice cues and vibrations, and can describe the scene in the viewfinder in supported countries and languages, including US English.
• Guided Vision in the Gemini app on Android lets you share your camera in Gemini Live and ask about what's around you: reading small labels, finding an object, describing colors or a room. Google says it's rolling out slowly and warns, "Don't use it for navigation or obstacle detection."

Learning braille

We compared braille learning apps in a separate guide, the best apps to learn braille, including which are strongest for contracted braille. If you use VoiceOver or TalkBack, check how a learning app works with your screen reader before paying. For our own app, we wrote down what works and what we can't claim yet.

Braillito, our app, teaches the braille cells in lessons with exercises you play, with lives, levels and a daily streak: 59 lessons in 8 worlds in English. It also has a translator, a dictionary and a cell builder. Braillito is a subscription with no free version; depending on the plan, it starts with a free trial or a discounted first period, if it's your first subscription (is Braillito free?). Get Braillito.

How to choose

• Start free. Install Be My Eyes and one AI reader (Seeing AI, or Lookout on Android) and try them on real tasks before paying for anything.
• Match the app to the job. Quick labels and mail: an AI reader. Something that needs judgment, like matching an outfit or checking a screen: a volunteer. Long documents: Voice Dream. Travel: BlindSquare or your map app, alongside your cane or dog.
• Think about privacy. For bank statements or anything with ID numbers, an AI or a professional agent may feel better than a volunteer.
• Check your phone. Door detection needs a LiDAR iPhone, Ask Magnifier needs Apple Intelligence, and Guided Frame needs a Pixel 6 or later.
• Expect mistakes. AI descriptions can be wrong. For anything important, like medication or a form you're signing, double-check with a second app or a person.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best app for blind people?

There isn't one best app, because they do different jobs. For most people, Be My Eyes is the first to install: it's free on iPhone and Android and gives you both volunteers and an AI. Add Seeing AI or Lookout for quick reading, and a navigation app like BlindSquare or Google Maps if you travel on your own.

Is Be My Eyes free?

Yes. Be My Eyes is free for blind and low-vision users on iPhone and Android, including the volunteer calls and Be My AI. Its App Store listing says it is "Always free of charge."

What's the difference between Be My Eyes and Seeing AI?

Be My Eyes connects you with a sighted volunteer on a video call, and also includes Be My AI for photo descriptions. Seeing AI is Microsoft's AI-only app: it reads text and describes scenes, products, people, currency and colors without involving another person. Both are free.

Is Seeing AI available on Android?

Yes. Seeing AI is free on both iPhone and Android, with the same main channels.

Can an app replace a cane or a guide dog?

No. The apps in this guide add information, like what a sign says or which store you're passing, but they don't replace mobility skills. Apple says Detection Mode shouldn't be relied on for navigation, and Google says not to use Guided Vision for navigation or obstacle detection.