Last updated: October 15, 2026
A phone camera is great for a few cards. It is not great for a few thousand. The fast way to get a big collection into inventory is a document scanner: load a stack into the feeder, scan both sides to a folder, and drop that folder into SportsCardNetwork, which identifies and prices the whole batch for you. No desktop app to install, it all runs in your browser. Here is the full setup.
In your scanner's software, set a profile with these settings. You set this once and reuse it every time.
Load a stack of cards into the feeder and run the scan. A duplex ADF scanner will move at 30 to 60 cards a minute, so the loading is the slow part, not the scanning. Everything lands in the folder you picked. With duplex on, the files come out in order: front, back, front, back, which is exactly what SCN expects.
On your computer, open SCN and start an AI Scan. On desktop it shows a drop zone built for exactly this. Set the mode to Front + Back, then drag your whole folder onto it. SCN pairs the images, identifies each card (player, year, set, card number, parallel, and grade), pulls live comps, and works through the batch in small groups so a few hundred cards finish in minutes. You review and save them in a grid, no re-typing.
One setting makes sure the fronts and backs line up. In the AI Scan window, in Front + Back mode, you pick how your scanner laid the files out:
Pick the one that matches how you scanned and every card gets the right back. That is the whole trick to bulk-scanning cleanly.
A duplex sheet-feed document scanner, the kind with an automatic document feeder (ADF) that scans both sides in one pass. Office scanners like the Fujitsu ScanSnap iX1600, Epson DS-series, or Brother ADS-series all work. "Duplex" is the key feature: it captures the front and back of each card in a single pass, which is what lets SCN read both sides. A regular flatbed works too, you just place cards one or a few at a time.
Color, 300 DPI, and JPEG output to a folder. 300 DPI is plenty for the AI to read player, year, set, card number, and grade, and it keeps files small so a big batch uploads fast. Higher DPI just makes huge files with no accuracy gain. If your scanner offers it, turn on auto-crop/auto-size so each card is its own image.
As many as your plan allows scans for. SCN ingests the whole folder and works through it in small batches so a few hundred cards finish in minutes without overloading the identifier. For raw cards a duplex ADF scanner will run 30 to 60 cards a minute; the slow part is loading the feeder, not the software.
Yes. Scan all the fronts first, flip the whole stack, then scan all the backs into the same folder. When you drop the folder into SCN, switch the scan-order option to "All fronts, then all backs" and it pairs each front with the matching back. (A duplex scanner that does both sides in one pass uses the default "front, back, front, back" order.)
In Front + Back mode, yes. SCN uses both images to identify the card, which bumps accuracy on tricky parallels, variations, and anything where the back carries the card number or set info. If you only scan fronts, use Front-only mode and each image is treated as its own card.
No. SCN runs in your browser, so you use your scanner's own software to scan to a folder, then drag that folder into the AI Scan window on your computer. There is nothing to install, and it works the same on Windows or Mac.
New to SCN? The dealer software overview covers the full toolset, and inventory management walks what happens after the cards are in. Questions? Email support@sportscardnetwork.ai.