Why You Need This Tool
With Markdown, you can write efficiently and quickly anywhere, but when you need to distribute your documents to clients, bosses, friends, or mentors, raw Markdown files aren't quite professional enough. Most people expect documents that look consistent across all devices and even print uniformly. To meet these requirements, PDF is obviously much more professional than Markdown.
The Markdown to PDF real-time conversion tool on this page can quickly help you accomplish this task. You can continue working as usual, writing content in Markdown, and when you need to share or distribute it, use this tool to convert it into a beautifully formatted PDF. You don't need to install any additional software—simply copy and paste in your browser, then click the generate button to create the PDF document you want.
Different File Formats
Markdown focuses on content. You can use `**bold**` and `*italic*`, add headings with `#`—simple and efficient. It's readable as plain text, works great with Git, and runs on any computer. Perfect for drafting and collaboration.
PDF is quite the opposite—it focuses more on visual presentation. Every pixel is locked in position. Whether you open it on your phone, email it to your boss, or print it on paper, a PDF looks exactly the same. This consistency makes it the standard format for anything official, formal, or final.
The magic happens when you combine both: write quickly in Markdown, then present professionally in PDF. You get the best of both worlds without the usual hassle of manual document formatting.
When You Need This Conversion
Think about your recent work weeks. How many times have you written something in Markdown (perhaps in VS Code, Obsidian, or a simple text editor) but then needed to share it as a "professional" document? Maybe it was client documentation, a project proposal, or just meeting notes that needed to look presentable.
The usual workaround is painful: copy everything into Google Docs or Word, fix the formatting, add page numbers, maybe a table of contents, then export to PDF. By the time you're done, you've spent more time on formatting than writing.
This tool skips all those steps. Your Markdown stays in Markdown (version control friendly, easy to edit), but you can instantly generate a professional PDF whenever you need one. Perfect for technical documentation, business reports, academic papers, or any time you need to look professional while keeping your workflow simple.
Settings Configuration Guide
Don't worry—you don't need to understand every setting to get excellent results. Most default settings work perfectly fine. However, a few choices can significantly impact your document's appearance and usability.
Page size and orientation depend on what you're creating. A4 works for most international use, Letter if you're in North America. Landscape orientation can be helpful if you have wide tables or code blocks, but portrait is standard for most documents.
Font size affects both readability and page count. 11pt is a good balance—readable but not wasteful. Go with 12pt if accessibility is important, or 10pt if you need to fit more content per page.
Table of contents is worth enabling for anything longer than a few pages. It's automatically generated from your headings and makes the document much more navigable. You can place it on its own page for a more formal appearance.
Document metadata (title, author, date) gets embedded in the PDF file. This helps with organization if you're creating many documents, and it appears in file properties when people save your PDF.
Image Upload and Processing Guide
Images are usually the trickiest part of Markdown to PDF conversion. This tool will automatically scan your document and find every image reference. If any of them point to local files (like `./screenshot.png`) or broken links, you'll see a warning in the Images tab.
This tool cannot directly read files from your computer—that would be a security risk. Instead, you need to upload replacement images for anything that isn't already available online. Simply click the Images tab, upload the files, and you're all set.
All images are embedded directly into the PDF using Base64 encoding. This makes the file larger, but it also means your PDF is completely self-contained. No broken image links, no dependencies—it will work perfectly even if the original images disappear from the web.
Pro tip: if you plan to convert to PDF regularly, keep your images online (GitHub, imgur, your own website) rather than using local paths. This will save you the upload step every time.
Tips for Better Results
To generate high-quality PDF documents, you first need to ensure your Markdown has a well-structured format. Keep heading levels and styles consistent—don't jump from H1 to H3 without an H2 in between. This keeps your table of contents clean and makes the document easier to navigate.
Keep file sizes reasonable. The tool has a 1MB limit for uploaded Markdown files and a 10MB limit for processed content. These limits are quite generous, but if you're hitting them, consider splitting large documents or optimizing images.
Simple tables work better. Markdown tables with many columns might not fit well on a PDF page, especially in portrait orientation. Consider landscape orientation or break complex tables into multiple simpler ones.
Preview before sharing. After generating your PDF, open it in a separate tab and scroll through the entire document. Check that page breaks look good, tables fit properly, and images appear where they should. It only takes a minute and can save you from sending out a problematic document.
Remember that PDF is a fixed layout format. What looks perfect on your screen might break differently on a printed page. If print formatting matters for your use case, consider testing with your browser's print preview first.