### The PDF engine for modern JavaScript Create, parse, fill, merge, sign, and manipulate PDF documents
in Node, Deno, Bun, Cloudflare Workers, and every browser.
[![npm version](https://img.shields.io/npm/v/modern-pdf-lib?style=flat-square&color=cb3837)](https://www.npmjs.com/package/modern-pdf-lib) [![bundle size](https://img.shields.io/badge/gzip-36kb_core-blue?style=flat-square)](https://bundlephobia.com/package/modern-pdf-lib) [![tests](https://img.shields.io/badge/tests-5%2C135_passing-brightgreen?style=flat-square)](#) [![TypeScript](https://img.shields.io/badge/TypeScript-6.0-3178c6?style=flat-square&logo=typescript&logoColor=white)](#) [![License: MIT](https://img.shields.io/badge/license-MIT-yellow?style=flat-square)](LICENSE)
[Get Started](#quick-start) · [Features](#features) · [API](#api-surface) · [Why This?](#why-modern-pdf-lib)

---
## Quick Start ```sh npm install modern-pdf-lib ``` ```ts import { createPdf, PageSizes, rgb } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; const doc = createPdf(); const page = doc.addPage(PageSizes.A4); page.drawText('Hello from modern-pdf-lib', { x: 50, y: 750, size: 28, color: rgb(0.13, 0.13, 0.13), }); const bytes = await doc.save(); // Uint8Array const stream = doc.saveAsStream(); // ReadableStream const blob = await doc.saveAsBlob(); // Blob (browsers) ``` ### CDN (no install) Use directly in the browser via CDN — no bundler required: ```html ``` Also available via: - **unpkg:** `https://unpkg.com/modern-pdf-lib/dist/browser.mjs` - **esm.sh:** `https://esm.sh/modern-pdf-lib` ### Script Tag (no modules) For environments without ES module support, use the IIFE bundle which exposes a `window.ModernPdf` global: ```html ```
## Features

**Create & Draw** - Pages, text, images, shapes, SVG paths - TrueType & OpenType font embedding - Automatic font subsetting - JPEG / PNG image embedding - Image optimization (JPEG recompression, dedup, grayscale) - RGB, CMYK, grayscale colors - Linear & radial gradients, tiling patterns - Text layout (multiline, combed, auto-size)

**Parse & Modify** - Load existing PDFs (encrypted too) - Extract text with positions - Fill & flatten AcroForm fields - Merge, split, copy pages - Add / remove / reorder pages - Incremental saves

**Secure & Compliant** - AES-256 / RC4 encryption & decryption - Digital signatures (PKCS#7, visible/invisible, timestamps) - CRL/OCSP revocation checking & certificate chain validation - Incremental save with signature preservation - Multi-signature chains, MDP certification, LTV archival - Counter-signatures & field locking - PDF/A-1b through PDF/A-3u validation - Tagged PDF / PDF/UA accessibility - Structure tree & marked content - Redaction with content removal

**Advanced** - QR codes & barcodes (9 formats) - Table layout engine with pagination - JPEG2000 (JPXDecode) image support - WebP image embedding (lossy, lossless, alpha) - TIFF image embedding (multi-page, CMYK, direct mapping) - Image format auto-detection (PNG/JPEG/WebP/TIFF) - Form field JavaScript evaluation & sandboxing - Outlines / bookmarks - Optional content layers (OCGs) - File attachments & watermarks - Linearization (fast web view) - Browser helpers (download, blob, data URL) - Service Worker & Web Worker support - CLI: `npx modern-pdf optimize`

## Why modern-pdf-lib?

	modern-pdf-lib	pdf-lib
Runtime	Node, Deno, Bun, CF Workers, browsers	Node, browsers
Module format	ESM + CJS	CJS (with ESM wrapper)
TypeScript	6.0 strict	3.x
Parse existing PDFs	Yes (with decryption)	Yes
Text extraction	Yes (with positions)	No
Encryption	AES-256 + RC4	No
Digital signatures	PKCS#7, timestamps, CRL/OCSP, LTV, MDP	No
Incremental save	Signature-preserving, multi-sig chains	No
WebP images	Lossy, lossless, alpha	No
TIFF images	Multi-page, CMYK, direct mapping	No
JPEG2000 decoding	Full JPXDecode (JP2 + J2K)	No
Form JavaScript	Sandboxed evaluation	No
Forms	Full (7 field types)	Full
PDF/A compliance	1a/1b through 3a/3b/3u	No
Accessibility (PDF/UA)	Structure tree, checker	No
Merge & split	Built-in	Copy pages only
Annotations	18 types + appearances	No
Streaming output	ReadableStream	No
Layers (OCG)	Yes	No
Outlines	Yes	No
Watermarks	Yes	No
Redaction	Yes	No
Linearization	Yes	No
QR codes & barcodes	9 formats (QR, EAN, Code 128, PDF417…)	No
Table layout	Spanning, pagination, presets, overflow	No
Browser utilities	Download, blob, Web Worker, Service Worker	No
Image optimization	JPEG recompress, dedup, grayscale	No
WASM acceleration	Optional (compression, PNG, fonts, JBIG2, JPEG)	No
Dependencies	1 (fflate)	0
Maintained	Active	Inactive since 2021

## Runtimes | Runtime | Version | Status | |:---|:---|:---:| | **Node.js** | 25.7+ | Fully supported | | **Deno** | 1.40+ | Fully supported | | **Bun** | 1.0+ | Fully supported | | **Cloudflare Workers** | — | Fully supported | | **Chrome / Edge** | 109+ | Fully supported | | **Firefox** | 115+ | Fully supported | | **Safari** | 16.4+ | Fully supported |
## API Surface

Document — create, load, save, metadata

```ts import { createPdf, loadPdf, PageSizes } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; // Create from scratch const doc = createPdf(); doc.setTitle('Invoice #1042'); doc.setLanguage('en'); // Load existing const existing = await loadPdf(pdfBytes, { password: 'secret' }); // Save const bytes = await doc.save(); const stream = doc.saveAsStream(); ```

Pages — draw text, images, shapes, SVG

```ts const page = doc.addPage(PageSizes.LETTER); page.drawText('Hello', { x: 50, y: 700, size: 24 }); page.drawImage(imageRef, { x: 50, y: 400, width: 200, height: 200 }); page.drawRectangle({ x: 50, y: 300, width: 100, height: 50, color: rgb(0, 0.5, 1) }); page.drawCircle({ x: 200, y: 325, radius: 25 }); page.drawSvgPath('M 0 0 L 100 0 L 50 80 Z', { x: 300, y: 300 }); ```

Fonts — embed, subset, standard 14

```ts // Standard fonts (no embedding needed) const helvetica = doc.embedStandardFont('Helvetica'); // Custom TrueType / OpenType const fontBytes = await readFile('Inter.ttf'); const inter = await doc.embedFont(fontBytes, { subset: true }); page.drawText('Custom font', { x: 50, y: 500, font: inter, size: 18 }); ```

Forms — fill, create, flatten

```ts const form = doc.getForm(); form.getTextField('name').setText('Jane Doe'); form.getCheckbox('agree').check(); form.getDropdown('country').select('Canada'); form.flatten(); // Burn values into page content ```

Merge & Split

```ts import { mergePdfs, splitPdf, copyPages } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; const merged = await mergePdfs([pdf1Bytes, pdf2Bytes]); const pages = await splitPdf(pdfBytes, [ { start: 0, end: 4 }, // Pages 1-5 { start: 5, end: 9 }, // Pages 6-10 ]); ```

Encryption — AES-256, RC4, permissions

```ts const bytes = await doc.save({ userPassword: 'reader', ownerPassword: 'admin', permissions: { printing: true, copying: false }, }); ```

Digital Signatures

```ts import { signPdf, verifySignatures } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; const signed = await signPdf(pdfBytes, 'Signature1', { certificate: certDer, privateKey: keyDer, reason: 'Approved', appearance: { // optional visible signature rect: [50, 50, 200, 80], fontSize: 10, }, }); const results = await verifySignatures(signed); ```

Text Extraction

```ts import { loadPdf, extractTextWithPositions } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; const doc = await loadPdf(pdfBytes); const page = doc.getPage(0); const items = extractTextWithPositions(page.getOperators(), page.getResources()); for (const item of items) { console.log(`"${item.text}" at (${item.x}, ${item.y})`); } ```

Image Optimization — batch compress, deduplicate, CLI

```ts import { loadPdf, initWasm, optimizeAllImages, deduplicateImages } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; await initWasm({ jpeg: true }); const doc = await loadPdf(pdfBytes); // Deduplicate identical images const dedupReport = deduplicateImages(doc); // Optimize all images (JPEG recompression) const report = await optimizeAllImages(doc, { quality: 75, progressive: true, autoGrayscale: true, }); console.log(`${report.optimizedImages}/${report.totalImages} images optimized`); console.log(`Savings: ${report.savings.toFixed(1)}%`); const optimized = await doc.save(); ``` **CLI:** ```sh npx modern-pdf optimize report.pdf report-opt.pdf --quality 60 --grayscale --dedup -v ```

Tables — layout engine with spanning, pagination, presets

```ts import { createPdf, PageSizes, professionalPreset, applyPreset } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; const doc = createPdf(); const page = doc.addPage(PageSizes.A4); page.drawTable(applyPreset(professionalPreset(), { x: 50, y: 750, width: 495, headerRows: 1, rows: [ { cells: ['Product', 'Qty', 'Price', 'Total'] }, { cells: ['Widget A', '10', '$5.00', '$50.00'] }, { cells: ['Widget B', '25', '$3.50', '$87.50'] }, { cells: [{ content: 'Grand Total', colSpan: 3, align: 'right' }, '$137.50'] }, ], columns: [{ flex: 2 }, { width: 60 }, { width: 80 }, { width: 80, align: 'right' }], })); ```

QR Codes & Barcodes — 9 formats

```ts import { createPdf, PageSizes } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; const doc = createPdf(); const page = doc.addPage(PageSizes.A4); // QR code page.drawQrCode('https://example.com', { x: 50, y: 700, size: 120 }); // Barcodes (Code 128, EAN-13, UPC-A, Code 39, ITF, PDF417, Data Matrix) import { encodeCode128, encodeEan13, renderStyledBarcode } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; const barcode = encodeCode128('ABC-12345'); const ops = renderStyledBarcode(barcode, { x: 50, y: 500, height: 60 }); ```

PDF/A & Accessibility

```ts import { enforcePdfA, checkAccessibility } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; // Enforce PDF/A-2b compliance const archival = enforcePdfA(pdfBytes, '2b'); // Check accessibility const issues = checkAccessibility(doc); for (const issue of issues) { console.log(`[${issue.severity}] ${issue.code}: ${issue.message}`); } ```

## Install ```sh # npm npm install modern-pdf-lib # pnpm pnpm add modern-pdf-lib # yarn yarn add modern-pdf-lib # bun bun add modern-pdf-lib # deno import { createPdf } from 'npm:modern-pdf-lib'; ```
## WASM Acceleration All WASM modules are **optional**. Without them, identical output is produced using pure-JS fallbacks. ```ts import { initWasm } from 'modern-pdf-lib'; await initWasm({ deflate: true, // Faster compression png: true, // Faster PNG decoding fonts: true, // Faster font subsetting jpeg: true, // JPEG encode/decode for image optimization }); ``` | Module | Purpose | Speedup | |:---|:---|:---:| | libdeflate | Stream compression | ~2x | | png | PNG image decoding | ~5x | | ttf | Font parsing & subsetting | ~3x | | shaping | Complex script layout | ~10x | | jbig2 | JBIG2 bilevel image decoding | ~3x | | jpeg | JPEG encode/decode for image optimization | Required |
## Project Structure ``` modern-pdf-lib/ src/ core/ PDF document model, objects, writer, pages parser/ PDF loading, text extraction, content streams form/ AcroForm fields (7 types) + appearances annotation/ 18 annotation types + appearance generators accessibility/ Structure tree, marked content, PDF/UA checker compliance/ PDF/A validation & enforcement signature/ PKCS#7 signatures, timestamps, verification, CRL/OCSP crypto/ AES-256, RC4, MD5, SHA-256/384/512 compression/ Deflate (fflate + optional WASM) assets/ Font metrics/embed/subset, image embed, SVG barcode/ QR, Code 128, EAN, UPC, Code 39, ITF, PDF417, Data Matrix layout/ Table engine (spanning, pagination, presets, overflow) browser/ Download helpers, Service Worker, Web Worker layers/ Optional content groups (OCG) outline/ Bookmarks / document outline metadata/ XMP metadata, viewer preferences wasm/ Rust crate sources (6 modules) cli/ CLI tool (modern-pdf optimize) tests/ 4,282 tests across 199 suites docs/ VitePress documentation ```
## Contributing ```sh git clone https://github.com/ABCrimson/modern-pdf-lib.git cd modern-pdf-lib npm install npm test # 4,282 tests npm run typecheck # TypeScript 6.0 strict npm run build # ESM + CJS + declarations ```
## License [MIT](LICENSE) © 2026