Photograph any page and see the evidence behind its claims. SourceTrace finds the factual statements, then searches the web for real sources - never invented ones.
Photograph a page. See what's behind it.
SourceTrace takes a photo of any page — a book, a magazine, a newspaper, a printed article — pulls out the factual claims on it, and goes looking for the sources behind them.
HOW IT WORKS
Photograph the page, or pick a photo from your library.
SourceTrace reads it and lists the factual claims it makes.
For each claim, it searches the web and shows you what it found, with real links you can open and read.
Each claim comes back marked with what the evidence looks like: well supported, mixed, contradicted, or nothing found. You also see whether the author cited anything on the page itself, which is often the more interesting answer.
WHAT IT WON'T DO
SourceTrace never invents a source. Every link it shows came back from a live web search - no generated citations, no plausible-looking references to books that don't exist.
It also doesn't tell you what's true. A claim marked "well supported" means the search found sources that agree with it, not that a verdict has been reached. You get the evidence and the links; the judgment stays yours.
BUILT FOR
• Readers who want to check a striking statistic before repeating it
• Students and researchers tracing a claim back to its origin
• Anyone reading nonfiction who has wondered "where did that come from?"
PRIVACY
Your page is uploaded so it can be read and searched, and it isn't stored on our servers. Your history stays on your device. No account required, no advertising, no tracking.
Try the built-in example before you photograph anything - one tap shows a full analysis of a real passage.
As someone who works in academia, this app has been one of my go-to tools for evaluating source material before I use it in a seminar. Instead of manually tracking down a claim in an article, SourceTrace does it in seconds and tells you the evidence level behind it. It’s also a great model for students on how to actually vet a source rather than just trust it. I wish this existed earlier in my academic career!
Love this app!
KXC180
We need more of this!
Better answers, and an honest one where there was a misleading one.
• Sources you were meant to find. The app now searches using the whole page for
context rather than the claim sentence alone, so a name that means little by
itself - a common surname, a type of business, a location - is matched against
what the page is actually about rather than whoever else shares the name.
Measured on our own test set, it finds a known-good source for roughly two
claims in three, up from about half.
• A higher bar before a book is called wrong. Marking a claim Contradicted now
takes two independent sources rather than one, so a single loosely-related page
can no longer put a question mark over something you are reading.
• No claim quietly disappears. A claim the app struggled to search for used to
vanish from the results without a trace. It stays, and tells you what happened.
• "Author's own reporting." Some claims rest on an interview the author did, or
something they witnessed - the book is the source, and no search will find one.
Where we can tell, those now say so rather than reading as a failed search.
Version 1.9
The developer, ARMEN NISHAN CHANGELIAN, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .
Data Not Linked to You
The following data may be collected but it is not linked to your identity:
User Content
Usage Data
Privacy practices may vary, for example, based on the features you use or your age. Learn More
Accessibility
The developer has not yet indicated which accessibility features this app supports. Learn More
Information
Seller
ARMEN NISHAN CHANGELIAN
Size
3.3 MB
Category
Reference
Compatibility
Requires iOS 15.0 or later.
iPhone Requires iOS 15.0 or later.
iPad Requires iPadOS 15.0 or later.
iPod touch Requires iOS 15.0 or later.
Mac Requires macOS 12.0 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later.