Viewing PDFs in MAUI for C# .NET

This section covers how to create a PDF Viewer page, integrate IronPDF Viewer, and create a tab for it in a MAUI application. We demonstrate this with both a XAML and C# ContentPage. Choose the approach that best fits your development style and project requirements.

What Are the Steps to Add a Viewer Page?

1. Add a new page to your project by right-clicking on your project, then navigate to Add > New Item...
   

2. Navigate to the .NET MAUI section. To create a XAML page, select .NET MAUI ContentPage (XAML). For a C# file, select .NET MAUI ContentPage (C#). Give your file the name PdfViewerPage, then click Add.
   

3. In the XAML file, add the following code and save:

<!-- :path=/static-assets/pdf/tutorials/pdf-viewing/pdf-viewing-xaml-1.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<ContentPage ...
    xmlns:ipv="clr-namespace:IronPdf.Viewer.Maui;assembly=IronPdf.Viewer.Maui"
    ...>
    <ipv:IronPdfView x:Name="pdfView"/>
</ContentPage>

<!-- :path=/static-assets/pdf/tutorials/pdf-viewing/pdf-viewing-xaml-1.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<ContentPage ...
    xmlns:ipv="clr-namespace:IronPdf.Viewer.Maui;assembly=IronPdf.Viewer.Maui"
    ...>
    <ipv:IronPdfView x:Name="pdfView"/>
</ContentPage>

If you created a C# ContentPage instead, add the following code and save:

:path=/static-assets/pdf/content-code-examples/tutorials/pdf-viewing-3.cs

using IronPdf.Viewer.Maui;

public class MainPage : ContentPage
{
    private readonly IronPdfView pdfView;

    public MainPage()
    {
        InitializeComponent();

        this.pdfView = new IronPdfView { Options = IronPdfViewOptions.All };

        Content = this.pdfView;
    }
}

4. In your AppShell.xaml file, add the following to create navigation tabs:

<!-- :path=/static-assets/pdf/tutorials/pdf-viewing/pdf-viewing-xaml-2.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<Shell ...
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/dotnet/2021/maui"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2009/xaml"
    ...>
  <TabBar x:Name="AppTabBar">
      <Tab Title="Home">
        <ShellContent ContentTemplate="{DataTemplate local:MainPage}" Route="MainPage"/>
      </Tab>
      <Tab Title="PDF Viewer">
        <ShellContent ContentTemplate="{DataTemplate local:PdfViewerPage}" Route="PDFViewer"/>
    </Tab>
  </TabBar>
</Shell>

<!-- :path=/static-assets/pdf/tutorials/pdf-viewing/pdf-viewing-xaml-2.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<Shell ...
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/dotnet/2021/maui"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2009/xaml"
    ...>
  <TabBar x:Name="AppTabBar">
      <Tab Title="Home">
        <ShellContent ContentTemplate="{DataTemplate local:MainPage}" Route="MainPage"/>
      </Tab>
      <Tab Title="PDF Viewer">
        <ShellContent ContentTemplate="{DataTemplate local:PdfViewerPage}" Route="PDFViewer"/>
    </Tab>
  </TabBar>
</Shell>

5. Save your project, then build and run. You should see tabs in the top-left corner as shown below. Clicking on the "PDF Viewer" tab opens the IronPDF Viewer. The viewer provides a feature-rich interface for PDF document interaction.

On application start-up, IronPDF Viewer prompts the user to open a PDF by default. However, it can open a PDF automatically on start-up, which improves the user experience for applications that need to display specific documents immediately. You can load a PDF on start-up in three ways: by filename, through a byte array, and through a stream. Each method offers different advantages depending on your data source and application architecture.

How Do I Load by Filename?

To load a PDF by filename, specify the source of the PDF file in the IronPdfView tag in the XAML file. This is the simplest approach when working with local files:

<!-- :path=/static-assets/pdf/tutorials/pdf-viewing/pdf-viewing-xaml-3.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<ContentPage ...
    xmlns:ipv="clr-namespace:IronPdf.Viewer.Maui;assembly=IronPdf.Viewer.Maui"
    ...>
    <ipv:IronPdfView Source="C:/path/to/my/example.pdf" />
</ContentPage>

<!-- :path=/static-assets/pdf/tutorials/pdf-viewing/pdf-viewing-xaml-3.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<ContentPage ...
    xmlns:ipv="clr-namespace:IronPdf.Viewer.Maui;assembly=IronPdf.Viewer.Maui"
    ...>
    <ipv:IronPdfView Source="C:/path/to/my/example.pdf" />
</ContentPage>

Alternatively, load the PDF by filename programmatically using the IronPdfViewSource.FromFile method in a C# ContentPage. This approach offers more flexibility for dynamic file loading:

:path=/static-assets/pdf/content-code-examples/tutorials/pdf-viewing-4.cs

// We assume an IronPdfView instance is created previously called pdfView
pdfView.Source = IronPdfViewSource.FromFile("C:/path/to/my/example.pdf");

How Do I Load Through Byte Array?

When working with PDFs stored in databases or received from web services, you may need to load a byte array of a PDF. This is not possible from XAML, but you can achieve it in C# using the IronPdfViewSource.FromBytes method:

:path=/static-assets/pdf/content-code-examples/tutorials/pdf-viewing-5.cs

pdfView.Source = IronPdfViewSource.FromBytes(File.ReadAllBytes("~/Downloads/example.pdf"));

This method is useful when integrating with document management systems or when PDFs are generated dynamically using IronPDF's HTML to PDF capabilities.

How Do I Load Through Stream?

For PDFs loaded through a stream, especially when working with network resources or implementing progressive loading, use the IronPdfViewSource.FromStream method in C#:

:path=/static-assets/pdf/content-code-examples/tutorials/pdf-viewing-6.cs

pdfView.Source = IronPdfViewSource.FromStream(File.OpenRead("~/Downloads/example.pdf"));

Stream-based loading is ideal for handling large PDFs efficiently or working with encrypted document streams.