This article will use IronPDF - a Java library for creating PDF documents programmatically.

IronPDF - A Java Library

Iron Software engineers have now developed IronPDF for Java which helps Java developers to create, edit, and manipulate PDF documents. IronPDF allows you to work with all aspects of PDF files. It offers developers a wide range of features to create and customize PDFs. It also helps to control the layout and formatting of the PDF document.

The main features include the ability to create a PDF file from various sources such as HTML, JavaScript, CSS, XML documents, and various image formats. In addition, IronPDF offers the abilities to add headers and footers to your PDF, create tables in PDFs, include digital signatures, and attachments. It supports complete multithreading and provides even more features!

Steps to Convert HTML to PDF in Java

Prerequisites

To create a PDF Java conversion application, you need to download and install the following prerequisites:

1. Java Development Kit (JDK): The latest version of the JDK must be installed on your computer for the PDF conversion application to compile and run. The JDK can be downloaded from the Oracle website.

2. Maven: Maven must be installed as it is a build automation tool used mainly for Java projects. Maven can be downloaded from the Apache Maven website.

3. IronPDF Java Library: Now you need to add the latest version of the IronPDF Java Library as a dependency to your PDF conversion application. Add the following IronPDF dependency to the pom.xml file of your project:

   <dependency>
       <groupId>com.ironsoftware</groupId>
       <artifactId>ironpdf</artifactId>
       <version>LATEST_VERSION</version>
   </dependency>

   XML

4. You will also need to add the Slf4j dependency in the pom.xml file.

   <dependency>
       <groupId>org.slf4j</groupId>
       <artifactId>slf4j-simple</artifactId>
       <version>2.0.5</version>
   </dependency>

   XML

Once all the prerequisites are downloaded and installed, the project can now be used to convert HTML files to PDF documents in Java applications.

Adding Necessary Imports and License Key

First, you need to add the IronPDF import to your main Java file where you want to run the code for the PDF converter. You need to import all the required classes, and this can be done with this single line of code:

import com.ironsoftware.ironpdf.*;

import com.ironsoftware.ironpdf.*;

Next, in the main method, enter the license key you obtained at the time of purchase or trial key using the IronPDF setLicenseKey.

// Set the license key for IronPDF. Replace "Your license key" with your actual license key.
License.setLicenseKey("Your license key");

// Set the license key for IronPDF. Replace "Your license key" with your actual license key.
License.setLicenseKey("Your license key");

Convert HTML String to PDF

IronPDF can convert HTML content to PDF with simply one line of code.

// Convert an HTML string to a PDF document.
PdfDocument myPdf = PdfDocument.renderHtmlAsPdf("<h1> ~HTML2PDF in JAVA~ </h1> Made with IronPDF!");

// Save the PDF document to a file.
myPdf.saveAs(Paths.get("html_saved.pdf"));

// Convert an HTML string to a PDF document.
PdfDocument myPdf = PdfDocument.renderHtmlAsPdf("<h1> ~HTML2PDF in JAVA~ </h1> Made with IronPDF!");

// Save the PDF document to a file.
myPdf.saveAs(Paths.get("html_saved.pdf"));

In the above code, the [renderHtmlAsPdf](/java/object-reference/api/com/ironsoftware/ironpdf/PdfDocument.html#renderHtmlAsPdf(java.lang.String) method is used to pass the HTML string that will be converted to a PDF document. Then the [saveAs](/java/object-reference/api/com/ironsoftware/ironpdf/PdfDocument.html#saveAs(java.lang.String) method is called to generate the PDF.

This creates a PDF document named "html_saved.pdf" which contains the HTML content passed as a string.

Convert HTML File to PDF

With the following code, you can convert the HTML file into a PDF document:

// Render the HTML file as a PDF. The resulting PDF is stored in myPdf as a PdfDocument object.
PdfDocument myPdf = PdfDocument.renderHtmlFileAsPdf("example.html");

// Save the PdfDocument to a file.
myPdf.saveAs(Paths.get("html_file_saved.pdf"));

// Render the HTML file as a PDF. The resulting PDF is stored in myPdf as a PdfDocument object.
PdfDocument myPdf = PdfDocument.renderHtmlFileAsPdf("example.html");

// Save the PdfDocument to a file.
myPdf.saveAs(Paths.get("html_file_saved.pdf"));

Here, the [renderHtmlFileAsPdf](/java/object-reference/api/com/ironsoftware/ironpdf/PdfDocument.html#renderHtmlFileAsPdf(java.lang.String) method is used to convert an HTML file into a PDF file. CSS and JavaScript can also be rendered along with the HTML file, preserving the layout and formatting of the HTML file.

Convert HTML URL to PDF

Sometimes you want to create PDF files directly from a web page. For this purpose, the IronPDF library provides the method [renderUrlAsPdf](/java/object-reference/api/com/ironsoftware/ironpdf/PdfDocument.html#renderUrlAsPdf(java.lang.String) to convert HTML from a URL to PDF. So the URL is used as an argument to the method.

// Render the HTML content from a URL as a PDF. The resulting PDF is stored in myPdf as a PdfDocument object.
PdfDocument myPdf = PdfDocument.renderUrlAsPdf("https://ironpdf.com");

// Save the PdfDocument to a file.
myPdf.saveAs(Paths.get("url.pdf"));

// Render the HTML content from a URL as a PDF. The resulting PDF is stored in myPdf as a PdfDocument object.
PdfDocument myPdf = PdfDocument.renderUrlAsPdf("https://ironpdf.com");

// Save the PdfDocument to a file.
myPdf.saveAs(Paths.get("url.pdf"));

You can also specify the formatting of the PDF file, such as page size, page orientation, margin size, layout, and many other properties simply by using the ChromePdfRenderOptions and passing the layout options in the renderUrlAsPdf method as the second argument.

After running the project with any of the above code samples, PDF files will be generated for all HTML content. Below you can see the sample output of "Convert HTML to PDF".

URL to PDF Output

You can find further code examples to create PDFs from HTML on IronPDF's website for Java developers.

IronPDF Website

IronPDF renders all images and text without losing any formatting. Buttons are clickable, and text boxes are editable in the PDF file.

Summary

This article demonstrated how to create a PDF using the "Convert HTML to PDF" feature of the IronPDF Java API.

IronPDF for Java is free to use but for deployment purposes, it has a commercial license information which starts from only $999. You can also access the free trial of IronPDF for Java to test its functionality in production mode.