Get started with the Apryse Server SDK Python PDF library integration

In this guide, you'll begin by setting up your Python environment. Next, you'll explore sample PDFNet projects to understand the types of PDF outputs you can create with the Apryse Server SDK. You'll also create a simple Python application, add the Apryse Server SDK, and learn how to generate files programmatically.

Before you start:

• Install Visual Studio Code or another code editor to develop and debug code.
• Install Python 3 and pip. In this guide, we use Homebrew to manage the Python installation.
• Get your Apryse trial key.

Before getting started, ensure that Python and pip are installed. You’ll use pip to install the Apryse Server SDK.

1. Check whether Python and pip are installed:

1python3 --version
2python3 -m pip --version
3which python3

The python3 path should point to Homebrew (for example, /opt/homebrew/bin/python3 or /usr/local/bin/python3). If it points to /usr/bin/python3, you're using the system Python.

2. If Python and pip aren't installed, install them with Homebrew. This command installs the latest Python version with pip:

1brew install python

3. If Python and pip are installed with Homebrew, update Homebrew and Python. This also updates pip:

1brew update
2brew upgrade python

In this section, you’ll use the OfficeToPDFTest sample to convert a DOCX file to PDF using the Microsoft Office conversion API. You can use this sample to understand how document conversion works and as a reference for your own implementations.

1. Download the PDFNetPython3.zip file.
2. Double-click the downloaded PDFNetPython3.zip file to unzip it.
3. In your Documents folder, create a new ApryseSamples folder for the sample files. Use a different location if preferred.
4. Move the unzipped PDFNetPython3 folder to the new ApryseSamples folder.
5. Navigate to this location, right-click, and select New Terminal at Folder:

1~/Documents/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/OfficeToPDFTest/PYTHON

6. In the terminal, install the Apryse SDK using pip to fetch the package from Apryse's package index:

1python3 -m pip install apryse-sdk --extra-index-url=https://pypi.apryse.com

The message Successfully installed apryse-sdk ... appears in the terminal.

7. To add your license key, open this file in Visual Studio Code:

1~/Documents/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/LicenseKey/PYTHON/LicenseKey.py

8. Go to the LicenseKey = “YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY” line and replace the quoted text with your trial license key. Don't change any other information in this file. Save your changes.

1# Add your trial license key here
2LicenseKey = "YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY" 
3if LicenseKey == "YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY":
4    raise Exception("Please enter your license key by replacing \"YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY\" that is assigned to the LicenseKey variable in Samples/LicenseKey/PYTHON/LicenseKey.py. If you do not have a license key, please go to https://www.pdftron.com/pws/get-key to obtain a demo license or https://www.pdftron.com/form/contact-sales to obtain a production key.")
5

9. To run the sample, navigate to this folder, right-click, and select New Terminal at Folder:

1~/Documents/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/OfficeToPDFTest/PYTHON

10. In the terminal, run this script:

1chmod +x RunTest.sh
2./RunTest.sh

When you run the RunTest.sh script, the sample code loads a Microsoft Office document, converts it to PDF, saves the PDF, and outputs the following status messages to the console. For more details, review the OfficeToPDF sample code and the Convert MS Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) to PDF overview.

1PDFNet is running in demo mode.
2PackageV2: base
3PackageV2: office_conversion
4Saved Fishermen.pdf
5Saved the_rime_of_the_ancient_mariner.pdf
6Saved factsheet_Arabic.pdf
7Done.

11. Go to this directory to verify the output PDF files are present:

1~/Documents/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/TestFiles/Output

The folder structure looks similar to:

1Samples/TestFiles/Output/
2├── factsheet_Arabic.pdf
3├── Fishermen.pdf
4├── the_rime_of_the_ancient_mariner.pdf

12. Open the PDF files to see the converted output. The original DOCX files are located in the PDFNetPython3/Samples/TestFiles folder.

Converted PDF file showing the output generated from a DOCX document

Create a simple Python application that uses the Apryse Server SDK and PDFNet library to generate a PDF programmatically. In this section, you’ll set up a minimal project, add the required code, and run a script that creates a blank PDF document. This example provides a practical foundation for building more advanced document‑generation workflows.

Set up your project by creating a folder and preparing your workspace for the application.

1. Go to your Documents folder and create a new NewApryseProject folder.
2. In Visual Studio Code or your preferred editor, go to File > Open Folder.
3. Find the NewApryseProject folder and click to Open in Visual Studio Code.
4. Create a HelloWorld.py file at the root of your project.

Next, integrate the Apryse Server SDK into your Python application and add the code needed to generate a PDF.

1. Navigate to the ~/Documents/NewApryseProject directory in your terminal, then install the Apryse SDK using pip to fetch the package from Apryse's package index:

1python3 -m pip install apryse-sdk --extra-index-url=https://pypi.apryse.com

A successful output looks like:

1Looking in indexes: https://pypi.org/simple, <additional index>
2Collecting apryse-sdk
3  Downloading apryse_sdk-<version>.whl
4Installing collected packages: apryse-sdk
5Successfully installed apryse-sdk-<version>

2. Open the HelloWorld.py file in Visual Studio Code or your preferred code editor:

1~/Documents/NewApryseProject/HelloWorld.py

3. Add this code to the HelloWorld.py file, update your license key, and save your changes:

1# You can add the following line to integrate apryse-sdk
2# into your solution from anywhere on your system as long as
3# the library was installed successfully via pip
4
5from apryse_sdk import *
6
7def main():
8
9    # Initialize Apryse SDK
10    # Replace with your demo license key
11    PDFNet.Initialize("YOUR_LICENSE_KEY")
12
13    # This example creates a new document
14    # and a new page, then adds the page
15    # in the page sequence of the document
16    doc = PDFDoc()
17
18    page1 = doc.PageCreate()
19    doc.PagePushBack(page1)
20
21    # Save the document in a linearized
22    # format which is the most popular and
23    # effective way to speed up viewing PDFs
24    doc.Save(("output.pdf"), SDFDoc.e_linearized)
25
26    doc.Close()
27
28if __name__ == "__main__":
29    main()

With this code, you can:

• Import and initialize the Apryse Python SDK using your license key.
• Create a new PDF document and add a blank page.
• Save the document as a linearized PDF for optimized viewing.
• Perform document operations using the PDFNet API—in this case, creating and modifying a PDFDoc object.
• Close the document after saving.

Finally, build and run your application to confirm that the Apryse Server SDK is working correctly. After the application runs successfully, it will generate a blank PDF file locally.

1. Navigate to the Documents > NewApryseProject folder, and right-click to select New Terminal at Folder.
2. In the terminal, run the HelloWorld.py script:

1python3 -u HelloWorld.py 

A successful output looks similar to:

1PDFNet is running in demo mode.
2PackageV2: base

3. Navigate to the Documents > NewApryseProject folder.

4. Verify the blank output.pdf file was generated programmatically using the Apryse Server SDK. The folder structure looks similar to:

1NewApryseProject/
2├── HelloWorld.py
3└── output.pdf

Now that you've successfully run an OfficeToPDFTest sample (in section 2) and integrated the Apryse Server SDK Python PDF library into your application, you can try out 50+ samples depending on your needs.

You can try over fifty samples for the Apryse Server SDK.

To try additional samples, go to section 2. Convert DOCX to PDF, then choose a different sample to run.

In this guide, you'll begin by setting up your Python environment. Next, you'll explore sample PDFNet projects to understand the types of PDF outputs you can create with the Apryse Server SDK. You'll also create a simple Python application, add the Apryse Server SDK, and learn how to generate files programmatically.

PythonAWS Lambda Functions

Prerequisites

Before you start:

• Install Visual Studio Code or another code editor to develop and debug code.
• Install Python 3 and pip.
• Get your Apryse trial key.

License Key

Apryse collects some data regarding your usage of the SDK for product improvement.

The data that Apryse collects include:

• The names and number of API calls
• The number of pages in a document
• The version of the SDK
• The language of the SDK

For clarity, no other data is collected by the SDK and Apryse has no access to the contents of your documents.

If you wish to continue without data collection, contact us and we will email you a no-tracking trial key for you to get started.

Run Apryse SDK in production

A commercial license key is required for use in a production environment. Contact sales to purchase a commercial license key.

Keep your commercial license key confidential.

License keys are uniquely generated and strictly confidential. Don't publish or store them in any public location, including public GitHub repositories.

1. Set up Python and pip

Before getting started, ensure that Python and pip are installed. You’ll use pip to install the Apryse Server SDK. We used Ubuntu 25.10 to create this guide.

1. Check whether Python and pip are installed:

Bash

1python3 --version 
2python3 -m pip --version
3which python3

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On Ubuntu, /usr/bin/python3 is the system Python installed via the Advanced Package Tool (apt) package manager. This is expected and safe to use on Ubuntu systems.

2. If Python and pip aren't installed, or you want to ensure they're up-to-date, run:

Bash

1sudo apt update 
2sudo apt install python3 python3-pip python3-venv 

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The commands install Python 3, pip, and the venv module if they aren't already installed, and update them to the latest versions provided by Ubuntu.

Info

On most Ubuntu systems, the universe repository is already enabled. If a package cannot be found, you may need to enable it.

2. Convert DOCX to PDF

In this section, you’ll use the OfficeToPDFTest sample to convert a DOCX file to PDF using the Microsoft Office conversion API. You can use this sample to understand how document conversion works and as a reference for your own implementations. 

1. Download the PDFNetPython3.zip file.
2. Right-click the downloaded PDFNetPython3.zip file and select Extract to....
3. Select Home, New Folder, and then enter ApryseSamples as the folder name.
4. Click Create, then Select to unzip the file into your new ApryseSamples folder and to run the samples. Use a different location if preferred.
5. Navigate to this location, right-click, and select Open in Terminal:

Text

1~/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/OfficeToPDFTest/PYTHON

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6. In the terminal, install the Apryse SDK using pip to fetch the package from Apryse's package index:

Info

Install the Apryse SDK in a virtual environment to ensure it's isolated and installed in a predictable location. When running Python scripts that import apryse-sdk, make sure you activate the same virtual environment first.

Bash

1python3 -m pip install apryse-sdk --extra-index-url=https://pypi.apryse.com

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The message Successfully installed apryse-sdk ... appears in the terminal.

Info

The legacy PDFNetPython3 package on the default Python Package Index (PyPI) is no longer maintained.

7. To add your license key, navigate to this file and double-click to open:

Text

1~/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/LicenseKey/PYTHON/LicenseKey.py

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8. Go to the LicenseKey = “YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY” line and replace the quoted text with your trial license key. Don't change any other information in this file. Save your changes.

Python

LicenseKey.py

1# Add your trial license key here
2LicenseKey = "YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY" 
3if LicenseKey == "YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY":
4    raise Exception("Please enter your license key by replacing \"YOUR_PDFTRON_LICENSE_KEY\" that is assigned to the LicenseKey variable in Samples/LicenseKey/PYTHON/LicenseKey.py. If you do not have a license key, please go to https://www.pdftron.com/pws/get-key to obtain a demo license or https://www.pdftron.com/form/contact-sales to obtain a production key.")

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9. To run the sample, navigate to this folder, right-click, then select Open in Terminal:

Text

1~/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/OfficeToPDFTest/PYTHON

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10. In the terminal, run this script:

Bash

1chmod +x RunTest.sh
2./RunTest.sh

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When you run the RunTest.sh script, the sample code loads a Microsoft Office document, converts it to PDF, saves the PDF, and outputs the following status messages to the console. For more details, review the OfficeToPDF sample code and the Convert MS Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) to PDF overview.

Bash

1PDFNet is running in demo mode.
2PackageV2: base
3PackageV2: office_conversion
4Saved Fishermen.pdf
5Saved the_rime_of_the_ancient_mariner.pdf
6Saved factsheet_Arabic.pdf

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11. Go to this directory to verify the output PDF files are present:

Text

1~/ApryseSamples/PDFNetPython3/Samples/TestFiles/Output

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The folder structure looks similar to:

Text

1Samples/TestFiles/Output/
2├── factsheet_Arabic.pdf
3├── Fishermen.pdf
4├── the_rime_of_the_ancient_mariner.pdf

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12. Open the PDF files to see the converted output. The original DOCX files are located in the PDFNetPython3/Samples/TestFiles folder.

Converted PDF file showing the output generated from a DOCX document

3. Create a Python PDF app

Create a simple Python application that uses the Apryse Server SDK and PDFNet library to generate a PDF programmatically. In this section, you’ll set up a minimal project, add the required code, and run a script that creates a blank PDF document. This example provides a practical foundation for building more advanced document‑generation workflows.

Set up your project

Set up your project by creating a folder and preparing your workspace for the application.

1. Go to your Home directory and create a new NewApryseProject folder.
2. In Visual Studio Code or your preferred editor, go to File > Open Folder.
3. Find the NewApryseProject folder and click to Open in Visual Studio Code.
4. Create a HelloWorld.py file at the root of your project.

Add the SDK to your app

Next, integrate the Apryse Server SDK into your Python application and add the code needed to generate a PDF.

1. Navigate to the ~/NewApryseProject directory in your terminal, then install the Apryse SDK using pip to fetch the package from Apryse's package index

Info

Install the Apryse SDK in a virtual environment to ensure it's isolated and installed in a predictable location. When running Python scripts that import apryse-sdk, make sure you activate the same virtual environment first.

Bash

1python3 -m pip install apryse-sdk --extra-index-url=https://pypi.apryse.com 

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A successful output looks like:

Bash

1Looking in indexes: https://pypi.org/simple, <additional index>
2Collecting apryse-sdk
3  Downloading apryse_sdk-<version>.whl
4Installing collected packages: apryse-sdk
5Successfully installed apryse-sdk-<version>

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Info

The legacy PDFNetPython3 package on the default Python Package Index (PyPI) is no longer maintained.

2. Open the HelloWorld.py file in Visual Studio Code or your preferred code editor:

Text

1~/NewApryseProject/HelloWorld.py

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3. Add this code to the HelloWorld.py file, update your license key, and save your changes:

Python

HelloWorld.py

1# You can add the following line to integrate apryse-sdk
2# into your solution from anywhere on your system so long as
3# the library was installed successfully via pip
4
5from apryse_sdk import *
6
7def main():
8
9    # Initialize Apryse SDK
10    # Replace with your demo license key
11    PDFNet.Initialize("YOUR_LICENSE_KEY")
12    
13    # This example creates a new document
14    # and a new page, then adds the page
15    # in the page sequence of the document
16    doc = PDFDoc()
17    
18    page1 = doc.PageCreate()
19    doc.PagePushBack(page1)
20    
21    # Save the document in a linearized
22    # format which is the most popular and
23    # effective way to speed up viewing PDFs
24    doc.Save(("output.pdf"), SDFDoc.e_linearized)
25    
26    doc.Close()
27    
28if __name__ == "__main__":
29    main()

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With this code, you can:

• Import and initialize the Apryse Python SDK using your license key.
• Create a new PDF document and add a blank page.
• Save the document as a linearized PDF for optimized viewing.
• Perform document operations using the PDFNet API—in this case, creating and modifying a PDFDoc object.
• Close the document after saving.

Run and verify your setup

Finally, build and run your application to confirm that the Apryse Server SDK is working correctly. After the application runs successfully, it will generate a blank PDF file locally.

1. Navigate to the Home > NewApryseProject folder, and right-click to select Open in Terminal.
2. In the terminal, run the HelloWorld.py script:

Bash

1python3 -u HelloWorld.py 

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A successful output looks similar to:

Bash

1PDFNet is running in demo mode.
2PackageV2: base

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3. Navigate to the Documents > NewApryseProject folder.

4. Verify the blank output.pdf file was generated programmatically using the Apryse Server SDK. The folder structure looks similar to:

Text

1NewApryseProject/
2├── HelloWorld.py
3└── output.pdf

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Now that you've successfully run an OfficeToPDFTest sample (in section 2) and integrated the Apryse Server SDK Python PDF library into your application, you can try out 50+ samples depending on your needs.

You can try over fifty samples for the Apryse Server SDK.

To try additional samples, go to section 2. Convert DOCX to PDF, then choose a different sample to run.

Info

Additional modules are required for some sample functionality, such as OCR, CAD, and PDF-to-Microsoft Office. For more, see Add-on modules for Apryse Server SDK.

This guide will help you set up Apryse SDK serverless AWS Lambda functions. Your free trial includes unlimited trial usage and support from solution engineers.

Prerequisites

• Python 3.6-3.14
• An active AWS account

Initial setup

In this particular guide, we will demonstrate how to set up an AWS Lambda function to use Apryse SDK.

First, prepare a zip package with apryse-sdk embedded and your lambda_function.py.

From the command line, check your Python3 version. This information will be needed when you create your function later.

sh

1python3 --version

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From the command line:

sh

1mkdir YOUR_FUNCTION_FOLDER
2cd YOUR_FUNCTION_FOLDER
3python3 -m pip install --target . apryse-sdk --extra-index-url=https://pypi.apryse.com

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Copy your lambda source (i.e. lambda_function.py) to YOUR_FUNCTION_FOLDER. Then zip your package before uploading it to your AWS Lambda account.

sh

1zip -r ./YOUR_FUNCTION_FOLDER.zip .

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You can now upload YOUR_FUNCTION_FOLDER.zip to your AWS Lambda.

Second, create a lambda function in your AWS account and upload the zip package:

• Lambda > Functions > Create function > Author from scratch > Function name [YOUR_FUNCTION_NAME] > Runtime [Python3.x] (Choose the version that matches your Python3 version from the checking above.) > choose Create Function
• Upload from .zip file > Upload [your zip package] > Save
• Add triger > API Gateway > Create an API > REST > Security [Open]
• Configuration > General configuration > Edit > memory [Choose 10240MB]

Integrate into your application

Once you have followed the initial setup instructions, you can begin calling Apryse SDK APIs in your lambda function source. For example:

Python

1from base64 import b64encode, b64decode
2import json
3from apryse_sdk import *
4def lambda_handler(event, context):
5    if event["httpMethod"] == "GET":
6        return {
7            'statusCode': 200,
8            'body': json.dumps('Hello from Apryse!')
9        }
10    elif event["httpMethod"] == "POST":
11        try:
12            body = json.loads(event["body"])
13            PDFNet.Initialize("YOUR_APRYSE_LICENSE_KEY") # if you use apryse-sdk 9.1.0 and above. Otherwise use PDFNet.Initialize()
14            # your AWS lambda function goes here
15            message = {
16                'statusCode': 200,
17                'headers': {'Content-Type': 'application/json'},
18                'body': json.dumps(base64_string),
19            }
20            return message
21        except Exception as e:
22            message = {
23                'statusCode': 500,
24                'body': e
25                }
26            return (message)

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Run Sample Code

You can update python script of your AWS Lambda function with the following code or download the source code from our github respository. This snippet shows how to process a request sent from a client to convert an office document to PDF and send the output to client.

Python

1# This example shows how to create AWS Lambda functions using Apryse SDK.
2# A REST API request was posted with base64 encoded data by the client.
3# The request would be processed by the server and a response with base64 encoded data of OfficeToPDF output would be sent to the client.
4from base64 import b64encode, b64decode
5import json
6from apryse_sdk import *
7def lambda_handler(event, context):
8    if event["httpMethod"] == "GET":
9        return {
10            'statusCode': 200,
11            'body': json.dumps('Hello, please send base64 doc to use this Lambda!')
12        }
13    elif event["httpMethod"] == "POST":
14        try:
15            body = json.loads(event["body"])
16            base64str = body["file"]["data"]
17            filename = body["file"]["filename"]
18            base64_bytes = b64decode(base64str)
19            # save input doc
20            output_path = '/tmp/'
21            input_filename = filename.split('.')[0] + '.docx'
22            with open(output_path + input_filename, 'wb') as open_file:
23                byte_content = open_file.write(base64_bytes)
24            # Start with a PDFDoc
25            PDFNet.Initialize("YOUR_APRYSE_LICENSE_KEY") # if you use apryse-sdk 9.1.0 and above. Otherwise use PDFNet.Initialize()
26            pdfdoc = PDFDoc()
27            # perform the conversion with no optional parameters and save to /temp
28            Convert.OfficeToPDF(pdfdoc, output_path + input_filename, None)
29            # save the result
30            output_filename = filename.split('.')[0] + '.pdf'
31            pdfdoc.Save(output_path + output_filename, SDFDoc.e_linearized)
32            # sending data
33            with open(output_path + output_filename, 'rb') as open_file:
34                byte_content = open_file.read()
35            base64_bytes = b64encode(byte_content)
36            base64_string = base64_bytes.decode('utf-8')
37            print("Sending " + output_filename )
38            message = {
39                'statusCode': 200,
40                'headers': {'Content-Type': 'application/json'},
41                'body': json.dumps(base64_string),
42            }
43            return message
44        except Exception as e:
45            print(e)
46            message = {
47                'statusCode': 500,
48                'body': e
49                }
50            return (message)

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Testing

After you have uploaded your zip package to your AWS Lambda function and get its API endpoint in Configuration > Triggers, you can now do a simple test using REST API.

In order to use this function to convert an office document to PDF, the client needs to post a REST API request to the server. The request must include json data structured as in the code below.

Python

1json_data = {
2            "file": {
3                "encoding": "base64",
4                "data": base64_string_of_your_office_document,
5                "filename": filename,
6                "content-type": "application/pdf"
7            }
8        }

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Upon receiving a client's request, a response will be sent back to the client including the base64 encoded pdf output using the same json structure. All the client needs to do now is decode the encoded data into pdf. That's it!
Access the sample python code. After cloning the repository and installing necessary packages, please refer to /client/README.txt for detailed instructions. Navigate to the client folder, run the following command, and see the reponse to client's request in the console and check the output in the output folder:

sh

1python AWSLambdaExample.py --url <YOUR PUBLISHED FUNCTION URL>

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The client will send a REST API request to convert /input/simple-word_2007.docx to pdf and the server will send back the encoded data, which will then be saved as pdf in the output folder.

You can experiment with your own office document by putting it inside input folder:

sh

1python AWSLambdaExample.py --url <YOUR PUBLISHED FUNCTION URL> --filename <YOUR OFFICE FILENAME>

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We have shown how to set an AWS Lambda function using Apryse SDK. You can now experiment making your own functions, URLs, and can fully utilize Apryse SDK. If your have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact us!