Character inspection is inspection to check, recognize or determine characters printed on parts or products. The technology is also called print inspection and is used in various tasks, such as:

• Reading QR codes (2D codes) stamped on metal parts
• Character inspection of part numbers or model numbers
• Checking expiration dates on food containers

Parts and products are marked with expiration dates or product numbers. However, this is not useful when this information cannot be read, recognized, judged, stored, and managed accurately. Character inspection has become widespread in recent years for recognition or judgment based on characters extracted from captured image data. This page describes basic information about OCR (Optical Character Recognition) and OCV (Optical Character Verification) and the basic principle of character inspection.