Generate PDFs in Laravel

Generate PDFs from HTML, Markdown, URLs, or built-in templates in Laravel — using the built-in Http facade and the RenderPDFs REST API.

Get a free API key →Try in browser first

1. Install

RenderPDFs uses a plain REST API — no SDK required. For Laravel, install the dependency below and grab your API key from renderpdfs.com/signup (free, 100 PDFs/month, no credit card).

Setupbash

# Laravel ships with Http (Guzzle under the hood) — no install needed
# Just add your key to .env:
echo 'RENDERPDFS_KEY=rpdf_your_key' >> .env

2. Convert HTML to PDF

The simplest case: send an HTML string, get back a PDF binary. Anything Chromium renders works — Flexbox, Grid, web fonts, SVG, JavaScript.

HTML → PDFphp

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Http;

$response = Http::withHeaders([
        'X-API-Key' => config('services.renderpdfs.key'),
    ])
    ->post('https://api.renderpdfs.com/v1/generate', [
        'html' => '<h1>Invoice #' . $invoice->id . '</h1>',
    ]);

return response($response->body(), 200, [
    'Content-Type'        => 'application/pdf',
    'Content-Disposition' => 'attachment; filename="invoice.pdf"',
]);

3. Convert a URL to PDF

Pass url instead of html and RenderPDFs fetches the page, waits for JS, and snapshots it. Useful for archiving dashboards, public pages, or invoices served from your app.

URL → PDF from a Blade viewphp

$html = view('invoices.show', ['invoice' => $invoice])->render();

$pdf = Http::withHeaders(['X-API-Key' => config('services.renderpdfs.key')])
    ->post('https://api.renderpdfs.com/v1/generate', [
        'html'    => $html,
        'options' => ['format' => 'A4', 'printBackground' => true],
    ])
    ->body();

Storage::disk('s3')->put("invoices/{$invoice->id}.pdf", $pdf);

4. Use a built-in template

Skip the design work. RenderPDFs ships six battle-tested templates — invoice, receipt, report, contract, certificate, offer_letter. Send JSON, get a styled PDF.

Built-in invoice templatephp

$pdf = Http::withHeaders(['X-API-Key' => config('services.renderpdfs.key')])
    ->post('https://api.renderpdfs.com/v1/generate', [
        'template' => 'invoice',
        'data'     => [
            'company'        => $user->company,
            'invoice_number' => $invoice->number,
            'items'          => $invoice->items->toArray(),
        ],
    ])
    ->body();

5. Custom paper, margins, headers

Control page format, orientation, margins, and running headers/footers via the options object. All standard Chromium PDF settings are supported.

Send the PDF in a Mailablephp

// In your Mailable's build() method:
public function build()
{
    $pdf = Http::withHeaders(['X-API-Key' => config('services.renderpdfs.key')])
        ->post('https://api.renderpdfs.com/v1/generate', [
            'template' => 'invoice',
            'data'     => $this->invoice->toArray(),
        ])
        ->body();

    return $this->subject('Your invoice')
                ->view('emails.invoice')
                ->attachData($pdf, "invoice-{$this->invoice->number}.pdf", [
                    'mime' => 'application/pdf',
                ]);
}

6. Store the PDF and share a link

For emailable links or webhook payloads, set store: true in the body. The response becomes { url, expires_in } — the PDF is hosted on our CDN for 24 hours by default.

Async generation with a queued jobphp

// app/Jobs/GenerateInvoicePdf.php
public function handle(): void
{
    $result = Http::withHeaders(['X-API-Key' => config('services.renderpdfs.key')])
        ->post('https://api.renderpdfs.com/v1/generate', [
            'template' => 'invoice',
            'data'     => $this->invoice->toArray(),
            'store'    => true,   // returns { url, expires_in }
        ])
        ->json();

    $this->invoice->update(['pdf_url' => $result['url']]);
}

7. Notes & gotchas

Authentication

Every request needs an X-API-Key header. Grab a free key at renderpdfs.com/signup — 100 PDFs/month, no credit card. Treat the key like a password: keep it server-side, never expose it in browser code.

Config tip

Add a `services.renderpdfs.key` entry in `config/services.php` mapped to `env('RENDERPDFS_KEY')`, then reference it as `config('services.renderpdfs.key')`. Keeps env reads cached and out of your runtime code.

Handling errors

Non-2xx responses return JSON: { error: string }. The most common cases are 401 (bad API key), 402 (over plan quota), and 422 (invalid HTML or URL). Always parse the error body before retrying.

Other languages

Node.js →Python →PHP →Ruby →Go →Django →Next.js →

Generate your first PDF in 60 seconds

100 free PDFs per month. No credit card. HTML, Markdown, URLs, templates, MCP — all included.

Get your free key →Read the docs