Show HN: Card-Snap – Generate Printable Flashcards from Any Document
4 lelia_florina 13 4/26/2025, 9:51:12 PM card-snap.com ↗
Hi HN,
I built Card-Snap: www.card-snap.com
It’s a very simple tool where you upload a document (Word, PDF, TXT), and it generates a PDF file with printable flashcards.
The idea came to me when helping my daughter study science. I realized that while there are many digital flashcard apps, it’s not easy to get physical flashcards without a lot of manual work.
Card-Snap is minimal: no signup, no tracking, no ads — just upload, pick how many questions you want, and download the printable cards.
I’d love your feedback!
Some questions I have:
Is the idea useful enough on its own?
What features would you expect next (e.g., export options, better formatting, templates)?
Would you prefer more control over card content?
Thanks so much for taking a look!
I would love to be able to use this without paper at all. Ideally, the app would "create" my own personal unique random string and when I open that url I would get a flashcard shown (full-screen, no menus). When touched/clicked, the flashcard would flip. When clicked again, it would proceed to the next card, and this would be stored in cookie so, on next visit, we can continue where we left of.
In this way I could dedicate a phone or a tablet, mount it on a wall or a cupboard and use it every day for flashcards. No printing, no cutting.
Thanks.
For now, Card-Snap is focused on printable, physical flashcards because there are already many digital flashcard apps out there.
That said, I can see how a super-minimal, distraction-free viewer could be useful for setups like using a dedicated tablet.
Just curious — what made you want something new rather than using existing flashcard apps like Anki, Quizlet, or Brainscape?
(It would be really helpful for me to understand what’s missing or frustrating in the current options.)
Thanks again for taking the time to share your ideas!
I don't think any of those mentioned have the functionality I described. I could be wrong, though.
Is there an app that could publish flash cards as a URL?
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Now, about data storage, you have two options:
1.) store data on your server (not recommended) and hand out the ticket* to the user to use in a URL. Pros: can open the same project on any device. Cons: someone would have to pay for storage, would have to fend off abuse or introduce data expiry, and so on (huge hassle).
2.) store data in user browser's local storage (recommended) and hand out the ticket to the user to use in a URL. Pros: your server has to store no data. Cons: once created, the flashcard player can only be used on that one browser/device. No big deal, if needed on another device, the user can start the data-ingestion flow again from that other device and thus get another ticket* and run the playback of the same flashcard set on another device.
*ticket would be just a random string that would identify the dataset and would be a query parameter in the URL. It would be up to the user to bookmark that URL and give it a sane name.
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Now, to answer your questions:
> 1.) the main need is to have a link you can prepare in advance and revisit anytime, so you can review flashcards fullscreen, one by one, from any device (like a phone or tablet)?
Yes. A phone, a tablet, a TV, an e-ink panel, a raspberry Pi device... any device that has a decent enough browser. That's why the flashcard page itself has to be as simple as possible. Maybe a set title, the card number out of total number, and that's it. The only possible interaction should be a click anywhere on the screen.
> 2.) would you use it as your main way to study, or more as a casual daily reinforcement tool?
Casual daily reinforcement tool.
Thanks.
Also curious: would you prefer a totally free version forever, or something with a few premium templates later on?
Out of curiosity: do you usually print on blank index cards at home? Or would you prefer a ready-to-order printable file (like a print shop format)?
Trying to understand better how you'd use it!
What I had in mind was to generate the same flash cards 1-up on index-card-sized PDF pages. Then the user can print onto blank index cards and avoid the cutting.
I hope that answers your question!