Gotenberg

App in the BluixApps catalog

What it is

Gotenberg is a developer-friendly API for PDF generation — HTML → PDF, Markdown → PDF, Office docs → PDF, image conversion, PDF merging. Stateless service powered by headless Chromium + LibreOffice. Drop into any backend that needs server-side PDF rendering.

The "PDF microservice" — designed to be called by other apps, not used directly.

What it's for

  • Invoice / report PDF generation — HTML/CSS templates → branded PDFs
  • Office doc conversion — DOCX/XLSX/PPTX → PDF for downloads
  • Markdown rendering — docs → PDF for distribution
  • URL screenshots — render web pages as PDF
  • Bulk document conversion — batch HTML → PDF via API

Who it's for

  • Backend developers building apps that generate PDFs
  • SaaS engineering teams needing branded PDF exports
  • Document workflow automation orgs handling many formats
  • Internal tools auto-generating reports
  • Multi-tenant apps rendering customer-branded PDFs

Why teams pick Gotenberg over alternatives

  • MIT license — fully open
  • Stateless API — easy to scale horizontally
  • Multi-format input — HTML, Markdown, Office, images, URLs
  • High fidelity — Chromium-based rendering matches browser exactly
  • Active development — frequent releases
  • Docker-native — zero install friction

Integrations

  • Chromium — HTML/CSS rendering, URL screenshots
  • LibreOffice headless — Office document conversion
  • PDF engines — pdfcpu / qpdf for merge/manipulate
  • API clients — Python, JS, Go, PHP community libraries
  • Frameworks — Laravel, Symfony, Rails, Django integrations
  • CI/CD — generate PDFs in pipeline for testing
  • Webhook callbacks — async result delivery (Pro feature)

Notable users & community

  • 8k+ GitHub stars
  • Used by SaaS teams worldwide for backend PDF generation
  • Active GitHub Discussions
  • Backed by Julien Neuhart (single maintainer with commercial offering)
  • Standard tool in microservices architectures needing PDF

Tips & operations

  • No auth by default — front with nginx + auth_request for production
  • Resource limits per request — large HTML can spike memory
  • Async via webhook — for slow conversions, use webhook callback
  • Custom fonts — bind-mount font directory for branded PDF rendering
  • PDF compression — Gotenberg supports output compression
  • Chrome flags — pass via API for special rendering (e.g., dark mode)

What we ship in BluixApps

  • Docker image: gotenberg/gotenberg:8
  • Port 3030 exposed (mapped from container 3000)
  • Stateless — no volume needed
  • Auth at reverse proxy (no built-in auth)
  • HTTPS via Let's Encrypt reverse proxy
  • Health endpoint /health for monitoring
  • No backup needed (stateless service)
Read this app's deep dive on bluix.app ↗

Get this app — pick a BluixApps plan

Same catalog. Scaling tenant isolation, white-label and support tier.

TierTenantsCatalogSupportWhite-labelMonthly
Stacks119 curated stacksStandard$19/moDetailDeploy
Starter10Full catalogStandard+$15–25/mo$49/moDetailDeploy
Pro25Full catalogPriority bugfix+$15–25/mo$149/moDetailDeploy
Growth100Full catalogPriority bugfix+$15–25/mo$349/moDetailDeploy
Scale500Full catalog7-day window+$15–25/mo$799/moDetailDeploy
EnterpriseUnlimitedFull catalogPriority 7-dayBundled$1,499/moDetailDeploy

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