pdf2png

Convert PDF files to PNG images with customizable DPI and page selection.

Features

• Convert entire PDFs or specific page ranges to PNG images
• Customizable DPI/resolution (default: 150 DPI)
• Progress bar showing conversion status
• TypeScript-based for type safety
• Simple CLI interface
• Uses PDF.js for reliable PDF rendering

Installation

Global Installation (Recommended for CLI usage)

npm install -g pdf2png

Local Installation

npm install pdf2png

Usage

Basic Usage

Convert all pages of a PDF to PNG images:

pdf2png input.pdf output

This will create output1.png, output2.png, output3.png, etc. for each page in the PDF.

Custom DPI

Specify a custom DPI for higher or lower resolution output:

# High resolution (300 DPI)
pdf2png input.pdf output --dpi 300

# Low resolution for thumbnails (72 DPI)
pdf2png input.pdf output --dpi 72

DPI Reference:

• 72 DPI: Screen resolution, smaller files
• 150 DPI: Default, good balance of quality and file size
• 300 DPI: Print quality, larger files

Page Range Selection

Convert specific pages or page ranges:

# Convert only pages 1-5
pdf2png input.pdf output --pages 1-5

# Convert pages 1, 3, and 5-10
pdf2png input.pdf output --pages 1,3,5-10

# Convert only page 7
pdf2png input.pdf output --pages 7

Disable Progress Bar

If you want to suppress the progress bar output:

pdf2png input.pdf output --no-progress

Full Example

pdf2png document.pdf page --dpi 300 --pages 1-10,15,20-25

This converts pages 1-10, 15, and 20-25 from document.pdf to PNG files at 300 DPI, creating:

• page1.png
• page2.png
• ...
• page10.png
• page15.png
• page20.png
• ...
• page25.png

CLI Options

Usage: pdf2png [options] <input-pdf> <output-scheme>

Arguments:
  input-pdf              Input PDF file path
  output-scheme          Output filename scheme (e.g., "output" creates output1.png, output2.png, ...)

Options:
  -V, --version          Output the version number
  --dpi <number>         DPI resolution for output images (default: "150")
  --pages <range>        Page range to convert (e.g., "1-5,7,10-12")
  --no-progress          Disable progress bar output
  -h, --help             Display help for command

Requirements

• Node.js >= 16.0.0
• npm or yarn

Technical Details

This package uses:

• pdf-to-png-converter: Reliable PDF to PNG conversion library built on pdf-poppler
• Commander.js: For CLI argument parsing
• cli-progress: For progress bar display

Development

Setup

# Clone the repository
git clone <repository-url>
cd pdf2png

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Build the project
npm run build

Scripts

• npm run build: Compile TypeScript to JavaScript
• npm run dev: Run CLI directly with tsx (development mode)

Testing Locally

To test the CLI locally before publishing:

# Link the package globally
npm link

# Now you can use pdf2png command
pdf2png test.pdf output --dpi 300

License

MIT

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

Issues

If you encounter any issues or have suggestions, please file an issue on the GitHub repository.

Author

Created with TypeScript and PDF.js