Use case

Certificate PDF API

Generate completion certificates, diplomas, and awards as pixel-perfect PDFs. Custom fonts, full bleed backgrounds, landscape layout — all via a single API call.

What makes certificates work

Google Fonts support

Reference any Google Font directly in your CSS @import. Chromium fetches and renders them. Use decorative serif fonts like Playfair Display for a premium look.

Full bleed backgrounds

Set margin to 0 and printBackground: true to render full-bleed background images, gradients, and colors. No white margins cutting off your design.

Landscape orientation

Traditional certificates are landscape A4 or letter. Set options.landscape: true — everything adjusts automatically.

Vector-quality output

CSS text and shapes are vector in the PDF. Logos embedded as SVG stay crisp at any print size. No blurry raster screenshots.

Generate a certificate

This example generates a dark-themed landscape certificate with a Google Font, gradient background, and gold typography — zero margin for a full-bleed result.

Node.js
const html = `
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
  <style>
    @import url('https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Playfair+Display:ital,wght@0,700;1,400&family=Inter:wght@400;500&display=swap');

    * { margin: 0; padding: 0; box-sizing: border-box; }
    body {
      width: 297mm; height: 210mm; /* A4 landscape */
      display: flex; align-items: center; justify-content: center;
      background: linear-gradient(135deg, #1a1a2e 0%, #16213e 50%, #0f3460 100%);
      font-family: 'Inter', sans-serif;
    }
    .certificate {
      text-align: center; color: white;
      border: 2px solid rgba(255,215,0,0.5);
      padding: 50px 80px;
      background: rgba(255,255,255,0.03);
    }
    .title { font-family: 'Playfair Display', serif; font-size: 48px; color: gold; margin-bottom: 8px; }
    .subtitle { font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: 4px; text-transform: uppercase; opacity: 0.6; }
    .recipient { font-family: 'Playfair Display', serif; font-style: italic; font-size: 36px; margin: 32px 0 16px; }
    .course { font-size: 20px; font-weight: 500; margin-bottom: 32px; }
    .date { font-size: 14px; opacity: 0.5; letter-spacing: 2px; }
  </style>
</head>
<body>
  <div class="certificate">
    <div class="title">Certificate of Completion</div>
    <div class="subtitle">This certifies that</div>
    <div class="recipient">${name}</div>
    <div class="course">has successfully completed · ${course}</div>
    <div class="date">${date}</div>
  </div>
</body>
</html>
`;

const response = await fetch("https://api.getpapyr.dev/v1/render/pdf", {
  method: "POST",
  headers: {
    "Authorization": "Bearer pk_live_...",
    "Content-Type": "application/json",
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    html,
    options: {
      format: "A4",
      landscape: true,          // landscape for classic certificate shape
      printBackground: true,    // required for background gradients
      margin: { top: "0", right: "0", bottom: "0", left: "0" }, // full bleed
    },
  }),
});

const pdf = await response.arrayBuffer();

Certificate types

Course completion

Online learning platforms issuing certificates when a student finishes a course.

Professional certifications

Exam-based certifications with expiry dates and unique certificate IDs.

Employee awards

HR platforms generating employee-of-the-month or training completion certificates.

Event attendance

Conferences and workshops issuing attendance certificates to participants.

Diplomas

Coding bootcamps, trade schools, and online universities issuing diplomas.

Contest awards

Hackathons, competitions, and academic contests issuing winner certificates.

High-volume certificate generation

Generating certificates at the end of a course cohort? Papyr handles concurrent requests with a managed Chromium queue. The Pro plan supports 10,000 documents per month at $49/month — about $0.005 per certificate. For high-volume needs, the Scale plan covers 100,000 documents at $149/month.

Start generating certificate PDFs

100 free certificates per month. No credit card required.

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