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PDFlys

Quickstart

1. Get Your API Key

Sign up at pdflys.com and generate an API key:

  1. Go to Settings → API Keys
  2. Click Create Key
  3. Copy the key — it starts with pdf_live_ and is only shown once

2. Make Your First Request

Let's compress a PDF. Replace YOUR_API_KEY and document.pdf with your own values:

curl -X POST https://api.pdflys.com/api/v1/compress \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -F "file=@document.pdf" \
  -F "level=medium"

3. Get Your Result

For files under 5 MB, you'll get an immediate response with a download URL:

{
  "success": true,
  "data": {
    "fileId": "output/abc123.pdf",
    "url": "https://storage.pdflys.com/output/abc123.pdf?token=...",
    "expiresAt": "2026-02-25T11:00:00.000Z"
  }
}

Download your processed file from the url field. The link expires after 1 hour.

For larger files (>= 5 MB), you'll receive a jobId instead. Poll for the result:

curl https://api.pdflys.com/api/v1/jobs/YOUR_JOB_ID \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"

4. Try More Operations

Here are a few more things you can do:

Merge two PDFs:

curl -X POST https://api.pdflys.com/api/v1/merge \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -F "files=@report-q1.pdf" \
  -F "files=@report-q2.pdf"

Check accessibility compliance:

curl -X POST https://api.pdflys.com/api/v2/accessibility/check \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -F "file=@document.pdf"

Add a watermark:

curl -X POST https://api.pdflys.com/api/v1/watermark \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -F "file=@document.pdf" \
  -F "mode=text" \
  -F "text=CONFIDENTIAL" \
  -F "position=diagonal"

Next Steps