Dart PDF

last modified October 18, 2026

In this article we show how to create PDF documents in Dart language.

Portable Document Format (PDF) is a versatile file format created by Adobe that gives people an easy, reliable way to present and exchange documents.

$ dart pub add pdf

To produce PDF files in Dart, we use the pdf package. It is written in pure Dart and works in command-line programs, Flutter applications, and on the web. The widgets resemble the Flutter widgets, but they are different classes; therefore, we import the library with the pw prefix.

Dart PDF simple example

The following is a simple Dart example which produces a PDF document.

main.dart

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

void main() async {
  final pdf = pw.Document();

  pdf.addPage(pw.Page(
    pageFormat: PdfPageFormat.a4,
    build: (pw.Context context) {
      return pw.Center(
        child: pw.Text('An old falcon'),
      );
    },
  ));

  final file = File('simple.pdf');
  await file.writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());
}

The program creates a new PDF file and writes it to the disk. It contains centered text. The program prints nothing; the result is the simple.pdf file.

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

We import the required packages. The pdf.dart library contains low-level types such as PdfPageFormat and PdfColors; the widgets are in widgets.dart.

final pdf = pw.Document();

A new empty document is created.

pdf.addPage(pw.Page(
  pageFormat: PdfPageFormat.a4,
  build: (pw.Context context) {
    return pw.Center(
      child: pw.Text('An old falcon'),
    );
  },
));

A page is added with addPage. We provide the page format and the content. The content consists of a Text widget which is centered on the page with Center. A pw.Page holds exactly one page; for content that may span several pages, we use MultiPage.

final file = File('simple.pdf');
await file.writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());

The save method returns the document as bytes, which we write to a file.

Dart PDF metadata

The Document constructor accepts metadata such as the title and the author. They are shown by PDF viewers in the document properties.

main.dart

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

void main() async {
  final pdf = pw.Document(
    title: 'Falcons',
    author: 'Jan Bodnar',
    subject: 'Birds of prey',
  );

  pdf.addPage(pw.Page(
    build: (context) => pw.Center(
      child: pw.Text(
        'The peregrine falcon',
        style: pw.TextStyle(
          fontSize: 28,
          fontWeight: pw.FontWeight.bold,
          color: PdfColors.indigo,
        ),
      ),
    ),
  ));

  await File('meta.pdf').writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());
}

The text is styled with TextStyle: we set its size, weight, and colour. When no pageFormat is given, the A4 format is used.

Dart PDF header

A document header is created with Header.

main.dart

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

void main() async {
  const txt = '''
The Battle of Thermopylae was fought between an alliance of Greek city-states,
led by King Leonidas of Sparta, and the Persian Empire of Xerxes I over the
course of three days, during the second Persian invasion of Greece.
''';

  final pdf = pw.Document();

  pdf.addPage(pw.Page(
    pageFormat: PdfPageFormat.a4,
    build: (pw.Context context) {
      return pw.Column(children: [
        pw.Header(level: 0, text: 'The Battle of Thermopylae'),
        pw.Paragraph(text: txt),
      ]);
    },
  ));

  await File('header.pdf').writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());
}

The document contains a header and a paragraph of text.

return pw.Column(children: [
  pw.Header(level: 0, text: 'The Battle of Thermopylae'),
  pw.Paragraph(text: txt),
]);

The header and the paragraph are added to a column widget. We specify the level and text for the header and the text for the paragraph. The level 0 is the largest header.

Dart PDF bullets

A bullet is created with the Bullet widget.

main.dart

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

void main() async {
  const languages = ['Dart', 'F#', 'Clojure', 'Go', 'Groovy', 'Raku', 'Python'];

  final pdf = pw.Document();

  pdf.addPage(pw.Page(
    pageFormat: PdfPageFormat.a4,
    build: (pw.Context context) {
      return pw.Column(children: [
        pw.Header(level: 1, text: 'Programming languages'),
        for (final lang in languages) pw.Bullet(text: lang),
      ]);
    },
  ));

  await File('bullets.pdf').writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());
}

We have a header and a list of programming languages. Each language is displayed as a bullet. A collection for creates the widgets from the list.

Dart PDF rectangles

A rectangle is created with Rectangle.

main.dart

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

void main() async {
  final colors = [
    PdfColors.grey,
    PdfColors.amber300,
    PdfColors.green500,
    PdfColors.blue600,
  ];

  final pdf = pw.Document();

  pdf.addPage(pw.Page(
    pageFormat: PdfPageFormat.a4,
    build: (pw.Context context) {
      return pw.Row(
        mainAxisAlignment: pw.MainAxisAlignment.spaceBetween,
        children: [
          for (final color in colors)
            pw.SizedBox(
              width: 80,
              height: 80,
              child: pw.Rectangle(fillColor: color),
            ),
        ],
      );
    },
  ));

  await File('rectangles.pdf').writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());
}

We create a row of SizedBox widgets. In the boxes, we place rectangle widgets. The spaceBetween alignment distributes the free space between the boxes, which replaces the Spacer widgets.

pw.SizedBox(
  width: 80,
  height: 80,
  child: pw.Rectangle(fillColor: color),
),

For each rectangle, we define a fill colour.

Dart PDF footer

In the next example, we add a footer to our pages.

main.dart

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

void main() async {
  final pdf = pw.Document();
  final title = pw.LoremText();

  pdf.addPage(
    pw.MultiPage(
      footer: _buildFooter,
      build: (context) => [
        pw.Header(level: 1, text: title.sentence(1)),
        for (final n in [50, 70, 150, 250, 350, 450]) ...[
          pw.SizedBox(height: 20),
          pw.Lorem(length: n),
        ],
      ],
    ),
  );

  await File('footer.pdf').writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());
}

pw.Widget _buildFooter(pw.Context context) {
  return pw.Row(
    mainAxisAlignment: pw.MainAxisAlignment.spaceBetween,
    crossAxisAlignment: pw.CrossAxisAlignment.end,
    children: [
      pw.Text(
        'Page ${context.pageNumber}/${context.pagesCount}',
        style: const pw.TextStyle(
          fontSize: 12,
          color: PdfColors.blue700,
        ),
      ),
    ],
  );
}

The footer consists of a row that contains the current and the total page numbers.

final title = pw.LoremText();

The lorem classes provide some filler text for the document. This is a common practice in desktop publishing when testing.

pdf.addPage(
  pw.MultiPage(
    footer: _buildFooter,
    build: (context) => [
      ...
    ],
  ),
);

We have a multi-page document. The build function returns a list of widgets, which the MultiPage flows across as many pages as needed. The creation of the footer is delegated to the _buildFooter function.

pw.SizedBox(height: 20),
pw.Lorem(length: n),

We add some empty space with SizedBox. The Lorem widget adds n words of Latin filler text.

pw.Text(
  'Page ${context.pageNumber}/${context.pagesCount}',
  style: const pw.TextStyle(
    fontSize: 12,
    color: PdfColors.blue700,
  ),
),

The footer is a row with a Text widget. It contains the current page number and the count of all pages. Also, we style the text: we define its size and colour.

Dart PDF table

A table is created with TableHelper.fromTextArray. It is a complex helper with many options. (In older versions of the package, the same functionality was provided by the Table.fromTextArray constructor, which is now deprecated.)

main.dart

import 'dart:io';

import 'package:pdf/pdf.dart';
import 'package:pdf/widgets.dart' as pw;

const users = [
  ('John Doe', 'gardener'),
  ('Roger Roe', 'driver'),
  ('Joe Smith', 'teacher'),
];

void main() async {
  final pdf = pw.Document();

  pdf.addPage(pw.Page(
    pageFormat: PdfPageFormat.a4,
    build: genTable,
  ));

  await File('table.pdf').writeAsBytes(await pdf.save());
}

pw.Widget genTable(pw.Context ctx) {
  return pw.TableHelper.fromTextArray(
    border: null,
    cellAlignment: pw.Alignment.centerLeft,
    headerDecoration: const pw.BoxDecoration(
      borderRadius: pw.BorderRadius.all(pw.Radius.circular(1)),
      color: PdfColors.blue500,
    ),
    headerHeight: 25,
    cellHeight: 40,
    headerStyle: pw.TextStyle(
      color: PdfColors.white,
      fontSize: 10,
      fontWeight: pw.FontWeight.bold,
    ),
    cellStyle: const pw.TextStyle(
      color: PdfColors.blueGrey800,
      fontSize: 10,
    ),
    rowDecoration: const pw.BoxDecoration(
      border: pw.Border(
        bottom: pw.BorderSide(
          color: PdfColors.blueGrey900,
          width: .5,
        ),
      ),
    ),
    headers: ['Name', 'Occupation'],
    data: [
      for (final (name, occupation) in users) [name, occupation],
    ],
  );
}

We display users in a table. The users are stored in a list of records.

const users = [
  ('John Doe', 'gardener'),
  ('Roger Roe', 'driver'),
  ('Joe Smith', 'teacher'),
];

The data source for the table is a list of records. This replaces a dedicated class with an index-based accessor, which was needed in the older version of this example.

headerHeight: 25,
cellHeight: 40,
cellAlignment: pw.Alignment.centerLeft,

We have options that define the look of the table. Here we define the header and cell heights and the alignment of the cells.

rowDecoration: const pw.BoxDecoration(
  border: pw.Border(
    bottom: pw.BorderSide(
      color: PdfColors.blueGrey900,
      width: .5,
    ),
  ),
),

We define table bottom borders. We set the border colour and size.

headers: ['Name', 'Occupation'],
data: [
  for (final (name, occupation) in users) [name, occupation],
],

We set the headers for the table and fill it with data. Each row is a list of strings; the record pattern in the for loop extracts the two fields.

Source

Dart pdf library - documentation

In this article we have shown how to generate PDF documents in Dart.

Author

My name is Jan Bodnar, and I am a passionate programmer with extensive programming experience. I have been writing programming articles since 2007. To date, I have authored over 1,400 articles and 8 e-books. I possess more than ten years of experience in teaching programming.

List all Dart tutorials.

Ebooks

Dart PDF

Dart PDF simple example

Dart PDF metadata

Dart PDF header

Dart PDF bullets

Dart PDF rectangles

Dart PDF footer

Dart PDF table

Source

Author