Guides

Create a Document

ComPDF PDF SDK for Flutter lets you create a new PDF document without first opening a local PDF file. Use this feature to generate reports, receipts, forms, or other PDF files dynamically in your app.

After creating a document, you can insert pages, add annotations or form fields, and save the document to a specified location.

Initialize the SDK before creating a document. For initialization instructions, see Apply the License Key.

Create and Save a PDF Document

Call CPDFDocument.createDocument() to create a document instance. A newly created document has no pages, so insert a page before saving it as a PDF file.

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:compdfkit_flutter/compdfkit.dart';
import 'package:compdfkit_flutter/configuration/cpdf_configuration.dart';
import 'package:compdfkit_flutter/document/cpdf_document.dart';
import 'package:compdfkit_flutter/page/cpdf_page.dart';

Future<String> createPdfDocument() async {
  CPDFDocument? document;

  try {
    document = await CPDFDocument.createDocument();

    final inserted = await document.insertBlankPage(
      pageIndex: 0,
      pageSize: CPDFPageSize.a4,
    );

    if (!inserted) {
      throw StateError('Failed to insert a blank page.');
    }

    final directory = await ComPDFKit.getTemporaryDirectory();
    final savePath =
        '${directory.path}${Platform.pathSeparator}new_document.pdf';

    final saved = await document.saveAs(savePath);
    if (!saved) {
      throw StateError('Failed to save the PDF document.');
    }

    return savePath;
  } finally {
    await document?.close();
  }
}

createPdfDocument() returns the path of the generated PDF file. After saving the document, open it in the Reader:

final documentPath = await createPdfDocument();

ComPDFKit.openDocument(
  documentPath,
  configuration: CPDFConfiguration(),
);

Edit a Newly Created Document

The document instance returned by CPDFDocument.createDocument() supports the other CPDFDocument APIs. For example, you can:

• Add pages with insertBlankPage() or insertPageWithImagePath().
• Add annotations with addAnnotations().
• Add form fields with addWidgets().
• Save the generated PDF file with saveAs().

The example saves the file in the app's temporary directory, which the operating system may clear. To retain the file, provide saveAs() with a path in persistent storage or a location selected by the user.