pdfme is an open-source PDF generation library built entirely with TypeScript and React. It provides a complete toolkit for creating, designing, and generating PDF documents in both browser and Node.js environments. With over 4,200 GitHub stars and 50,000+ weekly npm downloads, pdfme has become one of the most popular open-source PDF generation solutions in the JavaScript ecosystem.

Core Components

The library is organized into several packages that work together:

• @pdfme/generator — The core PDF generation engine that takes JSON templates and input data to produce PDF files. Works in Node.js and the browser.
• @pdfme/ui — A React-based WYSIWYG template designer and PDF viewer that lets anyone visually create and edit PDF templates without writing code.
• @pdfme/common — Shared types, schemas, and utilities used across all pdfme packages.
• @pdfme/cli — A command-line interface for validating templates, diagnosing issues, and generating PDFs in agentic and CI/CD workflows.

How It Works

pdfme uses a JSON-based template format that describes the layout, fonts, and dynamic fields of a PDF. Templates define a base PDF (or blank page) with positioned schema elements like text fields, images, barcodes, QR codes, and tables. At generation time, you pass the template along with input data, and pdfme produces the final PDF.

The template designer provides a drag-and-drop interface for positioning elements, configuring fonts, setting alignment, and previewing the result in real time. Templates can be exported as JSON and reused across different inputs.

Agent Integration

For AI agents and automation workflows, pdfme offers several integration points:

• The CLI supports pdfme validate to check template JSON before generation
• pdfme doctor diagnoses runtime, font, and configuration issues
• pdfme generate --image --grid produces PDFs with visual layout inspection
• Templates are pure JSON, making them easy to generate, modify, and version-control programmatically

Installation

Install with npm:

npm install @pdfme/generator @pdfme/common

For the designer UI:

npm install @pdfme/ui

For CLI tools:

npm install -g @pdfme/cli

Use Cases

pdfme is used for invoices, contracts, certificates, reports, onboarding documents, HR forms, shipping labels, and any workflow requiring programmatic PDF creation with consistent formatting. The JSON template approach makes it particularly well-suited for agent-driven document generation where templates can be composed and filled dynamically.