html4pdf vs iText
This comparison is unusual in that the deciding factor is often legal rather than technical. Teams rarely leave iText because it is not good enough.
The short answer
If you need deep PDF manipulation on the JVM and can accept AGPL or buy a licence, iText is the strongest tool available. If you only need HTML turned into a document, the licence question is one you can skip entirely.
What iText is
iText is a mature PDF library for Java and .NET covering creation, manipulation, signing, forms, redaction and PDF/A. Its pdfHTML add-on converts HTML and CSS to PDF. It is dual licensed: AGPL, which requires you to publish the source of anything that uses it over a network, or a commercial licence.
Side by side
| iText | html4pdf | |
|---|---|---|
| Scope | The whole PDF specification | HTML, URLs and templates in, PDF out |
| Licence | AGPL, or commercial | Pay per document, no licence terms on your code |
| HTML and CSS | Via pdfHTML, its own implementation | Headless Chrome |
| JavaScript in the page | Not executed | Runs before capture |
| Digital signatures | Yes, thoroughly | No |
| PDF/A and PDF/UA | Yes | No |
| Editing existing PDFs | Yes | No, generation only |
| Where it runs | In your JVM | An HTTPS call |
Choose iText when
- You need signing, redaction, PDF/A or form manipulation, not just generation.
- Your product is open source, so AGPL costs you nothing.
- You have bought a commercial licence already.
- Everything must happen inside the JVM with no outbound call.
Choose html4pdf when
- You only need HTML turned into a document, and the licence conversation is pure overhead.
- Legal has asked what AGPL means for your closed source product.
- Your markup is a modern web page that pdfHTML's own CSS engine does not reproduce.
- You want the same approach from Java, Python and Node without three libraries.
See the code
The working example, in the language this decision is being made in.
iText: common questions
Is iText free for commercial use?
Only under AGPL, which generally requires publishing the source of the application that uses it, including over a network. Closed source products need a commercial licence. This is the usual reason teams look elsewhere.
What are the alternatives to iText in Java?
OpenPDF, a fork of the last LGPL version of iText, for manipulation. openhtmltopdf for XHTML with CSS 2.1. Apache PDFBox for low-level work. Or a rendering API when the input is a web page.
Does iText render modern CSS?
pdfHTML implements its own CSS support, which is good but is not a browser. Flexbox, grid and scripted content are where the gap shows.
Can I use both?
Commonly, yes: render the page with an API, then use a PDF library for signing or merging afterwards. They solve different problems.
Try it before you decide
New accounts get 10 free credits, no card. Send the HTML you already have and compare the output against whatever you are using now.
Other comparisons
- html4pdf vs PuppeteerRun Puppeteer yourself if PDFs are high volume and you already operate containers. Use an API if PDFs are a feature of your product and you do not want Chrome in your deployment.
- html4pdf vs wkhtmltopdfwkhtmltopdf is still fine for simple documents you already have working. For anything new, or anything using modern CSS, its archived WebKit engine is the problem you will eventually hit.
- html4pdf vs WeasyPrintIf your document is HTML and CSS with no scripts, WeasyPrint is excellent and free, and you should use it. If anything on the page is drawn by JavaScript, you need a browser.
- html4pdf vs DompdfDompdf is the right answer for a simple document on shared hosting with no extra services. It is the wrong answer for anything designed with modern CSS, because it implements CSS 2.1.
- html4pdf vs jsPDF and html2canvasjsPDF with html2canvas is free and needs no backend, and it produces a picture of your page rather than a document. If the text has to be selectable, searchable or printable at quality, it is the wrong tool.
- html4pdf vs @react-pdf/rendererUse react-pdf when the document is small, stable, and worth building as its own component tree. Use a renderer when the PDF should be the same thing your users already see on screen.
- html4pdf vs printing from the browserIf the user is the one who wants the PDF and is sitting in front of the page, use window.print() and a print stylesheet. If your system needs the file, you need a renderer.
- html4pdf vs PlaywrightPlaywright is the better browser automation library. It is not a better PDF pipeline, because the cost was never the library: it is operating the browser. Use it if you already run it, call an API if you do not.
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- html4pdf vs GotenbergGotenberg is the right answer if you want this capability inside your own infrastructure and have somewhere to run a container. We are the right answer if you want it without running anything.
- html4pdf vs mPDFmPDF is the best free answer in PHP for long, table-heavy documents written as documents. It is still its own engine, so a design built in a browser will not arrive intact.
- html4pdf vs ReportLabReportLab is the right tool when the document is a fixed, precise artefact and you want no dependencies. It is the wrong tool when the design changes often, because every change is a code change.
- html4pdf vs QuestPDFQuestPDF is excellent for documents you are happy to describe in C#. If the document already exists as a web page, you would be rebuilding it, and that duplication is the whole cost.
- html4pdf vs PDFKitPDFKit is a good fit for simple, fixed documents generated at volume, where no browser and no network is worth writing the layout by hand. Beyond that the hand-written layout becomes the problem.