PDF Export

Medium Converter can export articles to PDF, creating professionally formatted documents that are ready for printing or sharing.

Installation

PDF export requires additional dependencies:

pip install medium-converter[pdf]

Or if installing everything:

pip install medium-converter[all]

Basic Usage

Command Line

# Convert to PDF
medium convert https://medium.com/example-article -f pdf -o article.pdf

Python API

from medium_converter import convert_article

await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="pdf",
    output_path="article.pdf"
)

Customization Options

PDF export supports various customization options:

Option	Description	Default
page_size	Page size (A4, Letter, etc.)	"A4"
font_size	Base font size in points	11
font_family	Font family for text	"Helvetica"
margins	Page margins in inches	{"top": 1, "right": 1, "bottom": 1, "left": 1}
include_toc	Generate table of contents	True
include_cover	Generate cover page	True
include_images	Include images in PDF	True
syntax_highlighting	Enable syntax highlighting for code	True
header_text	Custom header text	None
footer_text	Custom footer text	None
page_numbers	Include page numbers	True

Command Line

medium convert https://medium.com/example-article -f pdf \
  --option page_size=Letter \
  --option font_size=12 \
  --option include_cover=true \
  --option header_text="Medium Article" \
  --option footer_text="Generated with Medium Converter"

Python API

await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="pdf",
    output_path="article.pdf",
    export_options={
        "page_size": "Letter",
        "font_size": 12,
        "font_family": "Times-Roman",
        "include_cover": True,
        "header_text": "Medium Article",
        "footer_text": "Generated with Medium Converter"
    }
)

Custom Styling

For advanced styling, you can provide a CSS stylesheet:

custom_css = """
@page {
    @top-center {
        content: "Custom Header";
    }
    @bottom-center {
        content: "Page " counter(page);
    }
}

h1 {
    color: #0066cc;
    font-size: 24pt;
}

pre {
    background-color: #f5f5f5;
    padding: 10pt;
    border-radius: 5pt;
}
"""

await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="pdf",
    output_path="article.pdf",
    export_options={
        "custom_stylesheet": custom_css
    }
)

Or provide a stylesheet file:

await convert_article(
    url="https://medium.com/example-article",
    output_format="pdf",
    output_path="article.pdf",
    export_options={
        "stylesheet_path": "path/to/custom.css"
    }
)

PDF Features

The PDF exporter provides several features:

1. Cover Page: Title, author, date, and estimated reading time
2. Table of Contents: Automatically generated TOC with page numbers
3. Header and Footer: Customizable header and footer content
4. Syntax Highlighting: Code blocks with syntax highlighting
5. Hyperlinks: Active hyperlinks to websites and internal references
6. Images: Embedded images with captions
7. Math Rendering: LaTeX math formulas rendered properly
8. Bookmarks: PDF bookmarks for easy navigation

Implementation Details

Under the hood, Medium Converter uses ReportLab for PDF generation. The process involves:

1. Parsing the article into a structured document
2. Converting the content to ReportLab's flowable objects
3. Applying styling and formatting
4. Generating the PDF with proper layout

For extremely complex layouts, consider using the LaTeX exporter and converting to PDF with a LaTeX processor.