Receipt Scanner: Turn a Pile of Receipts into a Spreadsheet
We all end up with a pile of receipts - for expenses, taxes, reimbursements, a project, a trip, the household budget. And sooner or later, someone has to key every line into a spreadsheet by hand.
Receipt Scanner does that for you. Snap a photo, and it reads the receipt - printed or handwritten - pulls out the store, date, items, and amounts, and hands you a clean CSV you can total, sort, and send to your bookkeeper.
It's good at the messy ones, too: faded carbon copies, handwritten invoices, and Philippine receipts with TIN and VAT lines - not just tidy printed ones.
What it does
Scan anything - printed receipts, faded copies, handwritten invoices, even handwritten payout and voucher sheets
AI extraction - reads each receipt with Claude and pulls out store, date, TIN, VAT, line items, quantities, unit costs, and totals
Auto-checks the math - it adds up the line items against the printed total and flags anything that doesn't reconcile, so you only eyeball the ones that need it
Categorizes items - so you can see where the money actually went
Review & fix - swipe through your receipts, correct any amount, flag one for follow-up, or delete it
Catches duplicates - warns you when the same receipt got photographed twice
Exports a CSV grouped by category - so summing your spend by type is a two-click pivot
Running total right at the top, so you always know where you stand
Everything stays on your phone - your data never leaves your device except the photo that's sent for extraction.
Who it's for
Anyone who'd rather not hand-type receipts: freelancers and small businesses tracking expenses, anyone sorting out taxes or reimbursements, a project or event budget, or a household keeping tabs. It's especially handy when your receipts come in every format under the sun - including handwritten slips and Philippine-style Official Receipts and Sales Invoices.
How to install it
Receipt Scanner isn't on the App Store - it's shared directly. You install it with a free tool called SideStore, which signs the app to your own Apple ID. It takes about 20-30 minutes the first time, then just works.
1. Download the app Receipt Scanner
Save it to your iPhone's Files app.
2. Watch the install + re-sign walkthrough
This walks through installing SideStore, adding an app, and the weekly re-sign - all from the iPhone, no computer required. (Steps shift a little with iOS versions; if yours looks different, the official SideStore docs are always current.)
3. Add your API key
The app uses Claude for the actual reading, so you'll add your own Anthropic API key (free to create at console.anthropic.com) in Settings > Test key. Scanning costs roughly PHP 0.5-2.5 per receipt.
What you'll need
An iPhone on iOS 17 or newer
A free Apple ID
An Anthropic API key
The one catch: weekly re-sign
Because it's installed with a free Apple ID, the app has to be re-signed every 7 days or it stops opening. SideStore does this automatically in the background - just open SideStore once a week as insurance. The walkthrough video shows exactly how.
Why I built it
Because manually reading receipts and computing totals is exactly the kind of tedious, error-prone work software should handle. The goal was simple: make sure every receipt gets captured, the numbers get checked, and it all lands in one spreadsheet - without anyone squinting at a faded carbon copy at 11pm.