Migrate from Gotenberg to PDFgen
Gotenberg is a self-hosted Docker API you deploy and scale yourself. PDFgen is the hosted equivalent — plus AI templates.
Gotenberg is a well-designed self-hosted option. The cost is ownership: you deploy the container, scale it under load, keep it secure and patched, and watch it in production.
PDFgen is the hosted equivalent. The same HTML-to-PDF capability, plus AI-built reusable templates and data merge, with no infrastructure for you to operate — one API call returns the PDF.
What is Gotenberg?
Gotenberg is an open-source, Dockerized API that wraps headless Chrome and LibreOffice. It’s self-hosted: you deploy, scale, secure and monitor the container yourself.
Why teams choose PDFgen
No headless browser to run
Rendering is fully hosted. There is no Chrome to launch, scale, patch or monitor — a single REST call returns the PDF binary or a hosted, expiring link.
No infrastructure to own
No container to deploy, scale, secure or monitor. Rendering capacity is managed for you, so you ship instead of operating a service.
AI builds the template
Describe a document in plain English — or upload a sample to start from — and PDFgen generates a reusable template. You skip the blank-page problem instead of hand-coding HTML.
PDFgen vs Gotenberg at a glance
| PDFgen | Gotenberg | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting | Fully hosted | Self-hosted Docker container |
| Scaling | Handled for you | You scale the containers |
| Operations | None — no service to run | Deploy, secure, patch, monitor |
| Templating | Handlebars + AI templates | DIY in your own code |
| Best for | Teams that don’t want PDF infra | Teams committed to self-hosting |
Comparison reflects each product's general approach and may change — check the latest Gotenberg docs for specifics.
Migrating from Gotenberg
Most migrations are a small change: replace your Gotenberg rendering step with a single POST to /api/v1/generate and keep your existing HTML. See the language guides for copy-paste examples in your stack.
Frequently asked questions
- Is PDFgen a hosted Gotenberg alternative?
- Yes. It offers the same HTML-to-PDF capability without self-hosting — no Docker container to deploy, scale or monitor — plus AI-built reusable templates.
- What do I give up by not self-hosting?
- Mainly the operational burden. You still send HTML (or Markdown, or a template) and get a PDF back; PDFgen runs the rendering instead of your infrastructure.
- Can I migrate my existing HTML?
- Yes — send the same HTML to /api/v1/generate. Use engine "legacy" for raw HTML or add Handlebars tokens for dynamic data.