How To Convert Markdown to PDF

How_to_Convert_Markdown_to_PDF.md

How to convert markdown to PDF:

This post reviews several methods for converting a Markdown (.md) formatted file to PDF, from UNIX or Linux machines.

Using Pandoc:

$ pandoc How_I_got_svg-resizer_working_on_Mac_OSX.md -s -o test1.pdf

Other methods:

GRIP

http://superuser.com/questions/689056/how-can-i-convert-github-flavored-markdown-to-a-pdf I've had success using grip to display markdown in Chrome and then use Chrome's "Save as PDF" option in the Print dialog.

pip install grip  
grip your_markdown.md

grip will render the markdown on localhost:5000 ... - just edit away and refresh the browser. Print when ready.

This gave a more reliable representation than pandoc and was lighter weight than installing LaTeX (required by pandoc for pdf generation).

The print is not command line in this answer, but still found this easier/more reliable (looked 100% like Github for a long document including relatively linked images and code highlighting).

Node.js

http://superuser.com/questions/689056/how-can-i-convert-github-flavored-markdown-to-a-pdf You can also use Node.js based markdown-pdf

npm install -g markdown-pdf
markdown-pdf /path/to/markdown

NOTES:

The GRIP results look just like GitHub README pages. The Pandoc result looks like (is) LaTex format. And the Node.js result is the most original looking, but slightly harder to read than GRIP output PDF. Overall, I prefer GRIP output.

You can also use gh-md-to-html for this, which is a command line tool that can also convert markdown to pdf (despite its name).

You can install it by installing wkhtmltopdf and then installing gh-md-to-html with

pip3 install gh-md-to-html[pdf_export]

And then use

gh-md-to-html path_to_your_file.md -p \<name\>.pdf 

The -p option declares under which file name to save the resulting pdf file; the "<name>" is automatically replaced with the name of your input file.

Under to hood, gh-md-to-html converts the file to html (as the name suggests) and then from html to pdf using wkhtmltopdf.

The resulting pdf file is, in any case, styled similar to how GitHub styles their README files; if you want to disable that, you can supply the option -s false to the command, which disables the default styling.
Code blocks are properly syntax highlighted in both cases, though.

The conversion process is done partially online (using GitHub's markdown REST API); in case you don't want that, you can use pip3 install gh-md-to-html[offline_conversion] and then run gh-md-to-html with the -o OFFLINE option.

gh-md-to-html also supports inline-formulas like pandoc (but has some advantages over it when it comes to markdown-flavor-tolerance rather than looks, as describes in its README), and supports the [[_TOC_]] syntax of GitLab-flavored markdown (both features can be disabled). It also supports supplying custom CSS to style the output.

The following command will start grip on your markdown and convert it to pdf using wkhtmltopdf (and display it using evince) :
grip my.md 10000 & ; PID=$! ; sleep 1 ; wkhtmltopdf http://localhost:10000 my.pdf ; kill $PID; evince my.pdf&

Hey @Hexdump74, your suggestion looks pretty cool, thanks.

I installed wkhtmltopdf and evince (Homebrew install) on macOS and then tried to alter your code. It would not run unless I removed the ; before sleep 1 and when I ran my code it hung up during the completion on a task. What happened? It seems to have hung up on the wkhtmltopdf step, but I'm not sure how to fix it. Let me know if you have any ideas for a solution.

Here is my Terminal log:

grip Practical00_Intro_to_R.md 10000 & PID=$! ; sleep 10 ; wkhtmltopdf http://localhost:10000 Practical00_Intro_to_R.pdf ; kill $PID; evince Practical00_Intro_to_R.pdf&
[1] 85776
 * Serving Flask app "grip.app" (lazy loading)
 * Environment: production
   WARNING: This is a development server. Do not use it in a production deployment.
   Use a production WSGI server instead.
 * Debug mode: off
 * Running on http://localhost:10000/ (Press CTRL+C to quit)
Loading pages (1/6)
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 -  ] 10%
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /__/grip/static/octicons/octicons.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /__/grip/asset/site-d3c48f1b58ea95d9efb184fd4592b411.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /__/grip/asset/github-eabfbaded2e91939e805d1a3af34018a.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /__/grip/asset/frameworks-481a47a96965f6706fb41bae0d14b09a.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /RStudio_white.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
[=======127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /RStudio_install_MASS.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /RStudio_white_rnorm_plot.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /RStudio_help_rnorm.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /RStudio_white_dampening.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /RStudio_number_seqs_full_gui.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /RStudio_mtcars.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:53] "GET /__/grip/static/octicons/octicons.woff?ef21c39f0ca9b1b5116e5eb7ac5eabe6 HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 -  ] 88%
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /__/grip/asset/site-d3c48f1b58ea95d9efb184fd4592b411.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /__/grip/asset/frameworks-481a47a96965f6706fb41bae0d14b09a.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /RStudio_white.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /__/grip/static/octicons/octicons.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /RStudio_white_rnorm_plot.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /__/grip/asset/github-eabfbaded2e91939e805d1a3af34018a.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /RStudio_help_rnorm.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /RStudio_white_dampening.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /RStudio_mtcars.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /RStudio_number_seqs_full_gui.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /RStudio_install_MASS.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:55] "GET /__/grip/static/octicons/octicons.woff2?ef21c39f0ca9b1b5116e5eb7ac5eabe6 HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [19/Aug/2021 09:06:56] "GET /__/grip/static/favicon.ico HTTP/1.1" 200 -

~J

Hi @phseiff, sorry I didn't see this before, but I just tried it with GitHub-flavored style and without (-s false flag) and your solution for converting Markdown to PDF worked very nicely!! Thank you.

Question: Is there a way to remove the border around GitHub content but keep the other GitHub styling? (I suppose you might alter the CSS, but I'm not sure how to do that...).

Thanks again!

~J

Thanks for checking it out @justincbagley, and glad you liked it!

There is no option to remove the border as of now, but you could add the following code to an additional file and supply this file via -x <file_name>:

<style>
.gist-file {
  border: none !important;
}
</style>

This will add the CSS to the generated file and remove the border around the page.

Hi @justincbagley.
Here is the output on my archlinux :

❯ grip my.md 10000 & PID=$! ; sleep 1 ; wkhtmltopdf http://localhost:10000 my.pdf ; kill $PID; evince my.pdf&
[1] 1057828
 * Serving Flask app 'grip.app' (lazy loading)
 * Environment: production
   WARNING: This is a development server. Do not use it in a production deployment.
   Use a production WSGI server instead.
 * Debug mode: off
 * Running on http://localhost:10000/ (Press CTRL+C to quit)
Loading page (1/2)
 * Error: could not retrieve styles: [Errno 20] Not a directory: '/home/manu/.grip/cache-4.5.2'
127.0.0.1 - - [23/Aug/2021 12:13:26] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [23/Aug/2021 12:13:26] "GET /__/grip/static/octicons/octicons.css HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [23/Aug/2021 12:13:26] "GET /img.png HTTP/1.1" 200 -
127.0.0.1 - - [23/Aug/2021 12:13:26] "GET /__/grip/static/octicons/octicons.woff2?ef21c39f0ca9b1b5116e5eb7ac5eabe6 HTTP/1.1" 200 -
Printing pages (2/2)
Done
[2] 1057867
[1]  - 1057828 terminated  grip my.md 10000

It works, but as you can see from my logs, the md is very simple. Could you try with this simple and small md (img.png is my github avatar) :

# Notes

* first point
* second point

![](./img.png)

if you get pandoc: pdflatex: createProcess: posix_spawnp: illegal operation (Inappropriate ioctl for device)

make sure you have basictex installed and reload your shell
jgm/pandoc#7570

Check out:

pandoc README.md -o README.pdf "-fmarkdown-implicit_figures -o" --from=markdown -V geometry:margin=.4in --toc --highlight-style=espresso

More dependencies, but it makes a great ToC!

Thanks for a great hint, @mzpqnxow !

cool too for converting many file types to pdf
https://gotenberg.dev/

there is no 100% looks like github ... and still bad view on pdf . for example

• marks like this one
  • oe

Please try this one using VS Code, it worked for me.

• Install VS Code Extension Markdown Pdf
• Now Open Command Pallete Ctrl+Shift+P
• Then choose Markdown PDF: Export(pdf) and then pdf will be generated in the corresponding directory.

When the README.md file is larger, it seems to convert upto 35 pages max, do you know any tricks to convert the entire README.md to PDF without any page limits?

@tektutor: By "it" do you mean pandoc, grip or markdown-pdf (Node.js) tool?

Works perfectly. Thanks.

Install VS Code Extension Markdown Pdf

Now Open Command Pallete Ctrl+Shift+P

Then choose Markdown PDF: Export(pdf) and then pdf will be generated in the corresponding directory.

Please try this one using VS Code, it worked for me.

* Install VS Code Extension `Markdown Pdf`

* Now Open Command Pallete `Ctrl+Shift+P`

* Then choose `Markdown PDF: Export(pdf)` and then pdf will be generated in the corresponding directory.

Great tip! Thanks.

Did you have any issues with the VsCode Extension Markdown PDF when using a GitHub remote Repository? I was using GitLab before that which worked perfectly, but now that I changed to GitHub it doesnt seem to work anymore. Im not getting specific errors, but only the message that the file destination cannot be found.

Managed to fix the Problem myself. It was due to one of my files not having the .md ending.

Please try this one using VS Code, it worked for me.

• Install VS Code Extension Markdown Pdf
• Now Open Command Pallete Ctrl+Shift+P
• Then choose Markdown PDF: Export(pdf) and then pdf will be generated in the corresponding directory.

Thank you @ajaykumar2017

Markdown PDF failed (on a Mac) to render my SVG images correctly. The SVG have a white background defined, but Markdown PDF render them in black.