HTML to PDF Online API

The Pdfcrowd online API is a professional solution that lets you create PDF from web pages and raw HTML code in your applications. The API is easy to use and the integration takes only a few lines of code.

PDF Samples

Here are some samples created with the API. Click a thumbnail to open the PDF.


Status report	JavaScript vector chart	Wikipedia page	Invoice	Newsletter

API Client Libraries Documentation & Downloads

Code Examples

Click your favorite language to see examples of how to create PDF from a web page, an HTML file, and an HTML string:

PHP

This code converts a web page and sends the generated PDF as an HTTP response:

<?php
require 'pdfcrowd.php';

try
{   
    // create an API client instance
    $client = new Pdfcrowd("username", "apikey");

    // convert a web page and store the generated PDF into a $pdf variable
    $pdf = $client->convertURI('http://www.google.com/');

    // set HTTP response headers
    header("Content-Type: application/pdf");
    header("Cache-Control: no-cache");
    header("Accept-Ranges: none");
    header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"google_com.pdf\"");

    // send the generated PDF 
    echo $pdf;
}
catch(PdfcrowdException $e)
{
    echo "Pdfcrowd Error: " . $e->getMessage();
}
?>

You can also convert raw HTML code, just use the convertHtml() method instead of convertURI():

    $pdf = $client->convertHtml("<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>");

The API lets you also convert a local HTML file:

    $pdf = $client->convertFile("/path/to/MyLayout.html");

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API PHP client documentation.

using System;
using System.IO;

public class PdfcrowdTest
{
  static void Main() {
    try 
    {
      FileStream fileStream;  

      // create an API client instance
      pdfcrowd.Client client = new pdfcrowd.Client("username", "apikey");

      // convert a web page and save the PDF to a file
      fileStream = new FileStream("google_com.pdf", FileMode.CreateNew);
      client.convertURI("http://www.google.com", fileStream);
      fileStream.Close();

      // convert an HTML string and store the PDF into a memory stream
      MemoryStream memStream = new MemoryStream();
      string html = "<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>";
      client.convertHtml(html, memStream);

      // convert an HTML file
      fileStream = new FileStream("file.pdf", FileMode.CreateNew);
      client.convertFile("c:/local/file.html", fileStream);
      fileStream.Close();

      // retrieve the number of tokens in your account
      int ntokens = client.numTokens();
    }
    catch(pdfcrowd.Error why) {
      System.Console.WriteLine(why.ToString());
    }
  }
}

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API .NET client documentation.

ASP.NET - C#

The following code converts a web page and sends the generated PDF as an HTTP response:

<%-- file: PdfGenerator.aspx --%>
<%@ Page Language="C#" CodeFile="PdfGenerator.aspx.cs" Inherits="Website.PdfGenerator"
         AutoEventWireup="true" %>

// file: PdfGenerator.aspx.cs
using System;
using System.IO;

namespace Website
{
  public partial class PdfGenerator : System.Web.UI.Page
  {
    protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
      System.Web.HttpResponse Response = System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Response;
      try
      {
          // create an API client instance
          pdfcrowd.Client client = new pdfcrowd.Client("username", "apikey");

          // convert a web page and write the generated PDF to a memory stream
          MemoryStream Stream = new MemoryStream();
          client.convertURI("http://www.google.com", Stream);

          // set HTTP response headers
          Response.Clear();
          Response.AddHeader("Content-Type", "application/pdf");
          Response.AddHeader("Cache-Control", "no-cache");
          Response.AddHeader("Accept-Ranges", "none");
          Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=google_com.pdf");

          // send the generated PDF
          Stream.WriteTo(Response.OutputStream);
          Stream.Close();
          Response.Flush();
          Response.End();
      }
      catch(pdfcrowd.Error why)
      {
          Response.Write(why.ToString());
      }
    }
  }
}

You can also convert raw HTML code, just use the convertHtml() method instead of convertURI():

    client.convertHtml("<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>", Stream);

The API lets you also convert a local HTML file:

    client.convertFile("c:/MyLayout.html", Stream);

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API .NET client documentation.

ASP.NET - Visual Basic

The following code converts a web page and sends the generated PDF as an HTTP response:

<%-- file: PdfGenerator.aspx --%>
<%@ Page Language="VB" CodeFile="PdfGenerator.aspx.vb" Inherits="Website.PdfGenerator"
         AutoEventWireup="true" %>

' file: PdfGenerator.aspx.vb
Imports System
Imports System.IO

Namespace Website
  Public Partial Class PdfGenerator
      Inherits System.Web.UI.Page
      Protected Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs)
        Dim Response As System.Web.HttpResponse = System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Response
        Try
            ' create an API client instance
            Dim client As New pdfcrowd.Client("username", "apikey")

            ' convert a web page and write the generated PDF to a memory stream
            Dim Stream As New MemoryStream
            client.convertURI("http://www.google.com", Stream)

            ' set HTTP response headers
            Response.Clear() 
            Response.AddHeader("Content-Type", "application/pdf")
            Response.AddHeader("Cache-Control", "no-cache")
            Response.AddHeader("Accept-Ranges", "none")
            Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=google_com.pdf") 

            ' send the generated PDF
            Stream.WriteTo(Response.OutputStream)
            Stream.Close()
            Response.Flush() 
            Response.End()
        Catch why As pdfcrowd.Error
            Response.Write(why.ToString())
        End Try
      End Sub
  End Class
End Namespace

You can also convert raw HTML code, just use the convertHtml() method instead of convertURI():

    client.convertHtml("<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>", Stream)

The API lets you also convert a local HTML file:

    client.convertFile("c:/MyLayout.html", Stream)

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API .NET client documentation.

Java

import com.pdfcrowd.*;
import java.io.*;

public class PdfcrowdTest {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        try 
        {
            FileOutputStream fileStream;     
 
            // create an API client instance
            Client client = new Client("username", "apikey");

            // convert a web page and save the PDF to a file
            fileStream = new FileOutputStream("google_com.pdf");
            client.convertURI("http://www.google.com/", fileStream);
            fileStream.close();

            // convert an HTML string and store the PDF into a byte array
            ByteArrayOutputStream memStream  = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
            String html = "<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>";
            client.convertHtml(html, memStream);

            // convert an HTML file
            fileStream = new FileOutputStream("file.pdf");
            client.convertFile("/path/to/local/file.html", fileStream);
            fileStream.close();

            // retrieve the number of tokens in your account
            Integer ntokens = client.numTokens();
        }
        catch(PdfcrowdError why) {
            System.err.println(why.getMessage());
        }
        catch(IOException exc) {
            // handle the exception
        }
    }
}

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API Java client documentation.

Python

import pdfcrowd

try:
    # create an API client instance
    client = pdfcrowd.Client("username", "apikey")

    # convert a web page and store the generated PDF into a pdf variable
    pdf = client.convertURI('http://www.google.com')

    # convert an HTML string and save the result to a file
    html="<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>"
    client.convertHtml(html, open('html.pdf', 'wb'))

    # convert an HTML file
    client.convertFile('/path/to/MyLayout.html', open('file.pdf', 'wb'))

    # retrieve the number of conversion tokens in your account
    ntokens = client.numTokens()

except pdfcrowd.Error, why:
    print 'Failed:', why

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API Python client documentation.

Django

The following code shows how to convert a web page in a view function:

import pdfcrowd
from django.http import HttpResponse

def generate_pdf_view(request):
    try:
        # create an API client instance
        client = pdfcrowd.Client("username", "apikey")

        # convert a web page and store the generated PDF to a variable
        pdf = client.convertURI("http://www.google.com")

         # set HTTP response headers
        response = HttpResponse(mimetype="application/pdf")
        response["Cache-Control"] = "no-cache"
        response["Accept-Ranges"] = "none"
        response["Content-Disposition"] = "attachment; filename=google_com.pdf"

        # send the generated PDF
        response.write(pdf)
    except pdfcrowd.Error, why:
        response = HttpResponse(mimetype="text/plain")
        response.write(why)
    return response

You can also convert raw HTML code, just use the convertHtml() method instead of convertURI():

    pdf = client.convertHtml("<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>")

The API lets you also convert a local HTML file:

    pdf = client.convertFile("/path/to/MyLayout.html")

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API Python client documentation.

Ruby

require 'rubygems'
require 'pdfcrowd'

begin
    # create an API client instance
    client = Pdfcrowd::Client.new("username", "apikey")

    # convert a web page and store the generated PDF into a pdf variable
    pdf = client.convertURI('http://www.google.com')

    # convert an HTML string and save the result to a file
    html="<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>"
    File.open('html.pdf', 'wb') {|f| client.convertHtml(html, f)}

    # convert an HTML file
    File.open('file.pdf', 'wb') {|f| client.convertFile('/path/to/MyLayout.html', f)}

    # retrieve the number of tokens in your account
    ntokens = client.numTokens()

rescue Pdfcrowd::Error => why
    print 'FAILED: ', why
end

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API Ruby client documentation.

Ruby on Rails

The following code shows how to convert a web page in a controller method:

require 'rubygems'
require 'pdfcrowd'

def generatePdf
  begin
    # create an API client instance
    client = Pdfcrowd::Client.new("username", "apikey")

    # convert a web page and store the generated PDF to a variable
    pdf = client.convertURI("http://www.google.com")

    # send the generated PDF
    send_data(pdf, 
              :filename => "google_com.pdf",
              :type => "application/pdf",
              :disposition => "attachment")
  rescue Pdfcrowd::Error => why
    render :text => why
  end
end

You can also convert raw HTML code, just use the convertHtml() method instead of convertURI():

    pdf = client.convertHtml("<head></head><body>My HTML Layout</body>")

The API lets you also convert a local HTML file:

    pdf = client.convertFile("/path/to/MyLayout.html")

To learn more, see the Pdfcrowd API Ruby client documentation.

Node.js

var pdf = require('pdfcrowd');

// create an API client instance
var client = new pdf.Pdfcrowd("username", "apikey");

// convert an HTML string and send the generated PDF in a HTTP response
client.convertHtml('<html>regular HTML code</html>', pdf.sendHttpResponse(response));

// convert a web page and save it to a file
client.convertURI('http://www.google.com', pdf.saveToFile("google_com.pdf"));

// convert a local HTML file:
client.convertFile('/local/file.html', pdf.saveToFile("file.pdf"));

Curl - REST API

$ curl -F "username=$username" -F "key=$apikey" -F 'src=http://www.google.com' \
>      http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/uri/ > google_com.pdf

$ curl -F "username=$username" -F "key=$apikey" -F 'src=@index.html' \
>      http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/html/ > file.pdf

$ html_producer | curl -F "username=$username" -F "key=$apikey" -F 'src=<-' \
>      http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/html/ > html.pdf

To learn more, see the REST API documentation.

Unix Shell

$ pdfcrowd.sh http://www.google.com > google_com.pdf
$ pdfcrowd.sh /path/to/html_file > html.pdf
$ html_producer | pdfcrowd.sh - > file.pdf

To learn more, see the pdfcrowd.sh documentation.

Features

Create PDF from a web page or an uploaded HTML document.
Full HTML/CSS2/JavaScript support.
Set PDF options such as page dimensions, margins, encryption, permissions, initial view, ...
Fully customizable headers and footers.
You can upload a zipped HTML document with external resources (images, stylesheets).
When security is a concern, the API can be called over HTTPS.

Why Pdfcrowd API?

The API is available virtually on any platform that supports HTTP.
Easy integration, no third party libraries needed.
The API is proven by our customers. Have a look at what they say about our solution.
We work very hard to provide high quality support on our forums.
99.9% uptime. The API is fast and reliable, check our uptime report provided by a third party

Testing the integration with your application is free. We will credit your account with enough free conversions so you can make sure that everything works to your satisfaction before going to production.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask. We will gladly help you on our support forums.

REST API Documentation

An API call is made by sending an HTTP request to the API endpoint with parameters passed as POST data. The API endpoints support both http and https schemes.

Authentication

The following parameters are used for authentication and must be present in every API call.

Parameter	Description
username	Your username at Pdfcrowd
key	API key. Can be found on your account page. Note that the key is regenerated when you change your password.

PDF Creation

A PDF document can be created in one of the following ways. The created PDF is returned in the response body.

Convert a web page
Method	POST
API Endpoint	http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/uri/
Content Type	application/x-www-form-urlencoded
Post Data	Mandatory `src` - A web page URL. Must start with `http://` or `https://` authentication parameters Optional common parameters

Convert a local HTML file
Method	POST
API Endpoint	http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/html/
Content Type	multipart/form-data
Post Data	Mandatory `src` - A path to a local file. The file can be either an HTML document or a `.tar.gz`, `.tar.bz2`, or `.zip` archive which can contain external resources such as stylesheet, images, etc. authentication parameters Optional common parameters

Convert raw HTML code
Method	POST
Content Type	application/x-www-form-urlencoded
API Endpoint	http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/html/
Post Data	Mandatory `src` - HTML code to convert. authentication parameters Optional common parameters

Common Parameters

The following optional parameters control properties of the generated PDF file.

Page Setup

Parameter	Description
width	PDF page width in units.
height	PDF page height in units. -1 for a single page PDF.
hmargin	PDF page horizontal margin in units.
vmargin	PDF page vertical margin in units.

Page dimensions and margins can be specified in inches (in), millimeters (mm), centimeters (cm), or points (pt). If no units are specified, points are assumed.

Examples: 210mm, 8.5in

Headers and Footers

Parameter	Description
footer_text	Place plain text inside the page footer. The following variables are expanded: %u - Source URL. %p - The current page number. %n - Total number of pages.
footer_html	Place the specified HTML code inside the page footer. See footer_text for the list of variables that are expanded.
footer_url	Load HTML code from the specified URL and place it inside the page footer. See footer_text for the list of variables that are expanded.
header_html	Place the specified HTML code inside the page header. See footer_text for the list of variables that are expanded.
header_url	Load HTML code from the specified URL and place it inside the page header. See footer_text for the list of variables that are expanded.

HTML options

Parameter	Description
no_images	Do not print images.
no_backgrounds	Do not print backgrounds.
html_zoom	HTML zoom in percents. It determines the precision used for rendering of the HTML content. Despite its name, it does not zoom the HTML content. Higher values can improve glyph positioning and can lead to overall better visual appearance of the generated PDF .The default value is 100.
no_javascript	Do not run JavaScript in web pages.
no_hyperlinks	Do not create hyperlinks in the PDF.
text_encoding	The text encoding to use when none is specified in the web page. The default value is `utf-8`.
use_print_media	Use the `print` CSS media type (if available).

PDF Options

Parameter	Description
encrypted	Encrypt the PDF. This prevents search engines from indexing the document.
author	Set the PDF author field.
user_pwd	Protect the PDF with an user password. When a PDF has an user password, it must be supplied in order to view the document and to perform operations allowed by the access permissions. At most 32 characters.
owner_pwd	Protect the PDF with an owner password. Supplying an owner password grants unlimited access to the PDF including changing the passwords and access permissions. At most 32 characters.
no_print	Do not allow to print the PDF.
no_modify	Do not allow to modify the PDF.
no_copy	Do not allow to extract text and graphics from the PDF.
page_layout	Specifies the initial page layout when the PDF is opened in a viewer: `1` - Single page. `2` - Continuous. `3` - Continuous facing.
initial_pdf_zoom_type	Specifies the initial page zoom type when the PDF is opened in a viewer: `1` - Fit width. `2` - Fit height. `3` - Fit page. `4` - Zoom. The zoom is specified by initial_pdf_zoom.
initial_pdf_zoom	Specifies the initial page zoom when the PDF is opened in a viewer. Defaults to 100%.
page_mode	Specifies the appearance of the PDF when opened: `1` - Neither document outline nor thumbnail images visible. `2` - Thumbnail images visible. `3` - Full-screen mode.
max_pages	Print at most the specified number of pages.
pdf_name	The file name of the created PDF (max 180 chars). If not specified then the name is auto-generated.
pdf_scaling_factor	The scaling factor used to convert between HTML and PDF. The default value is 1.333 (4/3) which makes the PDF content up to 1/3 larger than HTML.
page_background_color	The page background color in RRGGBB hexadecimal format.
transparent_background	Do not print the body background. Requires the following CSS rule to be declared: `body { background-color:rgba(255,255,255,0.0); }`

Miscellaneous

Parameter	Description
fail_on_non200	The conversion request will fail if the source url returns 4xx or 5xx HTTP status code.
content_disposition	The value of the Content-Disposition HTTP header sent in the response. Allowed values: inline- The browser will open the PDF in the browser window. attachment - Forces the browser to pop up a Save As dialog. This is the default value.
pdfcrowd_logo	Insert the Pdfcrowd logo to the footer.

Examples of API calls

The following command converts www.google.com to PDF:

$ curl -F "username=$username" -F "key=$apikey" \
>      -F 'src=http://www.google.com' \
>      http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/uri/ > google_com.pdf

The following command converts the output of some html_producer application to PDF and protects it with an user password:

$ html_producer | curl -F "username=$username" -F "key=$apikey" \
>                      -F 'src=<-' \
>                      -F 'user_pwd=secret' \
>                      http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/html/ > google_com.pdf

The following command converts a local file index.html to PDF and disables printing:

$ curl -F "username=$username" -F "key=$apikey" \
>      -F 'src=@index.html' \
>      -F 'no_print=1' \
>      http://pdfcrowd.com/api/pdf/convert/html/ > google_com.pdf

Note, that the examples above ignore errors. If the API call fails google_com.pdf will contain an error message instead of PDF. For convenience, Pdfcrowd provides a shell wrapper around curl that checks for errors and generally makes the interaction with the API from the command line friendlier.

User Status

Number of remaining tokens
Method	POST
API Endpoint	http://pdfcrowd.com/api/user/<username>/tokens/
Content Type	application/x-www-form-urlencoded
Post Data	Mandatory authentication parameters

The response contains the result in plain text.

$ curl -F "username=$username" -F "key=$apikey" "http://pdfcrowd.com/api/user/$username/tokens/"
12399

Return Codes

The API returns the standard HTTP response status codes. These are the most important ones:

Code	Description
200 OK	The API call succeeded.
400 Bad Request	The user sent an invalid request. The body of the response contains an explanation in plain text.
413 Request Entity Too Large	See Limitations below.
502 Bad Gateway	See Limitations below.
503 Service Unavailable	See Limitations below.
510	A non-standard status code indicating that the server couldn't process the request. The body of the response contains an explanation in plain text.

Shell

Pdfcrowd provides a shell script which wraps curl and provides more convenient access to the API from shell.

The script reads options from ~/.pdfcrowd and then from the command line. You can store your default options to ~/.pdfcrowd, one option per line:

$ cat > ~/.pdfcrowd <<!
> -username "$username"
> -key "$apikey"
> -width 210mm
> -height 297mm
> !

Now, you can run:

$ pdfcrowd.sh http://www.google.com > google_com.pdf
$ pdfcrowd.sh /path/to/local/file > html.pdf
$ html_producer | pdfcrowd.sh - > file.pdf
$ echo "remaining tokens: $(pdfcrowd.sh @)"

On success, exit status 0 is returned and the result is written to stdout. Otherwise, non-zero exit status is returned and the error message is written to stderr. Run the script with -help to get the list of available options.

Data Security

We understand that your data may be sensitive and confidential and that it is absolutely unacceptable to disclose it or keep unnecessary copies.

We want to be transparent about how we process your data, so here we describe an API conversion request lifecycle:

Your request hits our HTTP server. Depending on the method you use:
- Any data uploaded with convertHtml or convertFile is temporarily saved to a directory (dirA/) on our server.
- Any other data is downloaded directly by the user agent during the conversion. The user agent has caching disabled.
Our backend process creates a PDF from your data and saves it temporarily to a directory (dirB/) on our server.
The HTTP server streams the created PDF from dirB/ back to you.
Both dirA/ and dirB/ are scanned every 10 minutes by a script which deletes the old files.

API Limitations

The following limits are applied to ensure fair distribution of capacity.

If you find the limits too restrictive we can provision a private server optimized for your specific needs with the limits lifted. If you would like to discuss this option please contact us.

Rate Limiting

The API returns an HTTP 503 Service unavailable status code in the following cases:

The client sends more than 30 requests per minute from a single IP. Note, that a query on the number of tokens counts against the limit.
The client sends more than one simultaneous request from a single IP at a time.
Ideally, you should serialize your API calls. However, we understand that you can't always ensure this in some environments, such as for instance with Google App Engine Task Queue. In such cases it is perfectly acceptable to check for this error and possibly send the failed request again.

Time Limit

If a request takes more than 40 seconds to complete it is cancelled and either of these messages may be returned:

510 - 413 Timed out. Can't load the specified URL.
502 - Sorry, we couldn't process your request.

A typical cause of this error is too many images on an HTML page which take too long to download. Another cause might be a long running JavaScript.

Size Limits

If the size of the uploaded data exceeds 4MB then an HTTP 413 Request entity too large error is returned. You can zip your HTML to avoid this error.

If the size of the downloaded data exceeds 100MB then the an HTTP 502 error code is returned.

Miscellaneous

We return an HTTP 502 error code also when:

The converted page loads more than 500 sub-resources (images, external stylesheets, etc.)
There is more than 8 HTTP redirects when attempting to load a page sub-resource.

"Fantastic service. Just implemented your API into our application and it works like a charm plus it looks really good. Thanks."

Christian Bürger
Metric Mail

More testimonials »

PHP Client Library Installation Getting Started Reference	Java Client Library Installation Getting Started Reference	DotNET Client Library Installation Getting Started (C#, VB, ASP) Reference
Python Client Library Installation Getting Started Reference	Ruby Client Library Installation Getting Started Reference	Others REST API Bash (Unix Shell) Node.js