Speed Test for OCR (both for Apple and KM versions)

Macro Library
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In a few seconds I'm going to upload a macro here that lets you do a speed test for your KM OCR action. The reason I have to post this short message first is that my macro will contain a link to this page to bring you here, and until the page exists, I can't create the link. :slight_smile:

The new Apple OCR feature in KM 11 is about 600% as fast as the OCR feature in KM v10. I had to measure it to see how much faster it was, so I did this test. Then I wanted to know how much faster it was on other people's Macs, so I created this macro to help other people gather that information, including the screen resolution and CPU model of your Mac. I'll post it here in a few seconds...

Speed Test for OCR Macro (v11.0)

Speed Test for OCR.kmmacros (18 KB)

Keyboard Maestro Export
Keyboard Maestro Export1590×8492 1.26 MB

My results are: (usually I get a 600% value, but not this time)

Apple M1;16 GB;macOS Sonoma;Version 14.0;27-inch (3840 × 2160)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.537334
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 8.352267
New OCR Performance Level: 543%

Please post your speed results here, especially if you use a different processor or screen size than my system has.

P.S. This is the first time I've ever seen a macro include a button that takes the user to a page in the KM forums where the relevant topic is discussed! Cute!

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16-inch, 2019;macOS Ventura;Version 13.5.2
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 2.526119
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 5.609776
New OCR Performance Level: 222%

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I think that's an Intel laptop. That explains why your performance gain is only 222%. Thanks for playing along.

4

Yep. M3 in the New Year. Yippeeeeee!

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I ordered my M3 iMac with 24 GB RAM which is supposed to arrive Nov 14-20, but my experience with Apple is that it usually arrives a couple of days early. I'll post the results of this test as soon as I get it, because faster OCR is one of the main reasons I ordered an M3 Mac. I use OCR a lot.

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That's odd, when you ran the macro it didn't post your screen resolution. That's the problem with writing macros that are supposed to run on multiple kinds of hardware when you don't have all the different hardware to test it on.

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3072 × 1920

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Here you go:

macOS Ventura;Version 13.6.1;27-inch (2560 × 1440);18-inch (1600 × 1200)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.362179
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 10.347119
New OCR Performance Level: 760%
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Similar here:

16-inch, 2019;macOS Ventura;Version 13.6.1;16-inch (3072 × 1920)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.134618
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 2.53058
New OCR Performance Level: 223%

I'm surprised to see that my Apple OCR speed is even better then the ones reported on M1 so far...

Makes you wonder whether this is a correct way to test the performance? :thinking:

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Apple M2 Pro;16 GB;macOS Sonoma;Version 14.1;27-inch (5120 × 2880)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.976438
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 17.164921
New OCR Performance Level: 868%

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Cool macro @Airy!

14-inch, 2023;Apple M2 Pro;16 GB;macOS Ventura;Version 13.6;14-inch (3024 × 1964)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.395173
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 7.27834
New OCR Performance Level: 522%
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Agreed, this is fun.

Apple M1;16 GB;Version 14.0;34-inch (5760 × 3600);27-inch (2560 × 1440)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.155793
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 5.06222
New OCR Performance Level: 438%

^ M1 Mac mini on macOS Sonoma - remote session from a 15" MBP (which is why it has an odd resolution).

macOS Ventura;Version 13.5.1;15.4-inch (2880 × 1800)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 4.958858
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 5.462469
New OCR Performance Level: 110%

^ on the 2012 15" MBP natively.

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I was actually thinking of having the macro actually post the results in the forum, with no user interaction.

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I have no idea, but since the speed of OCR is dependent on many things, including how many words are on your screen, we can't be sure if your measurement was measuring the same thing as ours. Maybe you had a clean screen when you ran the macro.

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16-inch, 2021;Apple M1 Max;64 GB;macOS Sonoma;Version 14.1
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.101448
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 9.050276
New OCR Performance Level: 822%

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Retina 5K, 27-inch, 2017;macOS Sonoma;Version 14.1;27-inch (5120 × 2880)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 2.300788
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 7.280909
New OCR Performance Level: 316%

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2021 macOS Sonoma;Apple M1;16 GB;Version 14.1;24-inch (4480 × 2520)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 1.633455
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 9.561314
New OCR Performance Level: 585%

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2019 Retina 5K, 27-inch, 2019;macOS Sonoma;Version 14.1;27-inch (5120 × 2880);72-inch (3840 × 2160)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 3.493251
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 10.908518
New OCR Performance Level: 312%

2021 Apple M1;16 GB;macOS Sonoma;Version 14.1;24-inch (4480 × 2520);52.5-inch (1920 × 1080)
New Apple OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 2.391269
Old KM OCR speed to read screen, in seconds: 27.625053
New OCR Performance Level: 1155%

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How did you get Sonoma to install on this iMac? I have the same version and can't install it?

Thanks Roger

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I don’t know how they did it, but I’m using Open Core Legacy Patcher on my unsupported Mac.

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