IronPdf is a library developed and maintained by Iron Software that helps Software Engineers to create, edit and extract PDF content in projects in Java.

• Generating PDFs from: HTML, URL, JavaScript, CSS and many image formats
• Adding headers/footers, signatures, attachments, and passwords and security
• Performance optimization: Full Multithreading and Async support
• And many more! Visit our website to see all our code examples and a full list of our 50+ features*

To define IronPDF as a dependency, please add the following excerpt to your pom.xml:

<dependencies>
  <dependency>
    <groupId>com.ironsoftware</groupId>
    <artifactId>ironpdf</artifactId>
    <version>20xx.xx.xxxx</version>
  </dependency>
</dependencies>

Once the dependence is defined, you can get started by adding the import com.ironsoftware.ironpdf.* statement to the top of your Java code. Here is a sample HTML to PDF example to get started:

PdfDocument pdfDocument = PdfDocument.renderHtmlAsPdf("<h1> ~Hello World~ </h1> Made with IronPDF!");
        pdfDocument.saveAs(Paths.get("html_saved.pdf"));

This is another example which demonstrates URL to PDF:

PdfDocument pdfDocument = PdfDocument.renderUrlAsPdf("https://ironpdf.com/java");
        pdfDocument.saveAs(Paths.get("url_saved.pdf"));

Note: Please note that all settings, logging, and licensing operations must be executed before any IronPDF methods are called.

com.ironsoftware.ironpdf.License.setLicenseKey("YOUR-LICENSE-KEY");

IronPdf Java uses the slf4j logger. To enable logging use:

com.ironsoftware.ironpdf.Settings.setDebug(true);

To specify the IronPdfEngine log path add:

com.ironsoftware.ironpdf.Settings.setLogPath(Paths.get("C:/tmp/myIronPdfEngineLog.log"));

Not familiar with slf4j? Just add this to your pom.xml:

<dependency>
  <groupId>org.slf4j</groupId>
  <artifactId>slf4j-simple</artifactId>
  <version>2.0.3</version>
</dependency>

IronPDF for Java is based on IronPDF for .NET, it will generally be about 1 version behind.

IronPDF for Java uses gRPC to communicate with the IronPdfEngine, which consumes IronPDF for .NET

IronPdfEngine is the core of IronPdf. To use IronPdf for Java IronPdfEngine binaries is required.

The IronPdfEngine process will start when you call any IronPdf function for the first time, and stop when your application is closed, or when it enters an idle stage.

By default IronPdf for Java will download IronPdfEngine binaries on the first run (or when it cannot find the binaries).

Note: For macOS, IronPdfEngine binaries that download on the first run might not work in your system (Gatekeeper on macOS). Please use IronPdfEngine as a maven dependency instead (next section)

By adding IronPdfEngine as a Maven dependency, the binaries will be downloaded during the loading of dependencies:

• This approach will avoid a lengthy startup process, as the IronPdfEngine binaries will already be downloaded.
• Moreover, it will be beneficial for deployment setups that do not allow downloading from external sources.

Simply add one or multiple of the following code snippets to your pom.xml file if you are working on a multiplatform app:

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.ironsoftware</groupId>
  <artifactId>ironpdf-engine-windows-x64</artifactId>
  <version>20xx.xx.xxxx</version>
</dependency>

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.ironsoftware</groupId>
  <artifactId>ironpdf-engine-windows-x86</artifactId>
  <version>20xx.xx.xxxx</version>
</dependency>

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.ironsoftware</groupId>
  <artifactId>ironpdf-engine-linux-x64</artifactId>
  <version>20xx.xx.xxxx</version>
</dependency>

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.ironsoftware</groupId>
  <artifactId>ironpdf-engine-macos-x64</artifactId>
  <version>20xx.xx.xxxx</version>
</dependency>

<dependency>
  <groupId>com.ironsoftware</groupId>
  <artifactId>ironpdf-engine-macos-arm64</artifactId>
  <version>20xx.xx.xxxx</version>
</dependency>

IronPdf for Java is free to use and test with an IronPDF watermark applied. To remove the watermark apply for a license or trial license..

For our full list of code examples, tutorials, licensing information, and documentation visit: https://ironpdf.com/java

For more support and inquiries, please email us at: support@ironsoftware.com