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PDF Search Text

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Search text in PDF and get coordinates. Supports regular expressions.

Available Methods

[POST] /pdf/find

Attributes
url required
URL to the source file. Supports links from Google Drive, Dropbox, and PDF.co built-in files storage. To upload files via API, Check out the Files Upload section.

Note: If you experience intermittent Too Many Requests or Access Denied errors, please try to add cache: to enable built-in URL caching. (e.g cache:https://example.com/file1.pdf)

For data security, you have the option to encrypt output files and decrypt input files. Learn more about user-controlled data encryption.
httpusername optional
HTTP auth user name if required to access source url.
httppassword optional
HTTP auth password if required to access source url.
searchString required
Text to search can support regular expressions if you set the regexSearch param to true.
pages optional
Comma-separated list of page indices (or ranges) to process. IMPORTANT: the very first page starts at 0 (zero).
To set a range use the dash -, for example: 0,2-5,7-.
To set a range from index to the last page use range like this: 2- (from page #3 as the index starts at zero and till the of the document) for ALL pages just leave this param empty. Example: 0,2-5,7- means the first page, then the 3rd page to the 6th page, and then the range from the 8th (index = 7) page till the end of the document, The input must be in string format.
inline optional
Must be one of: true, or false.
wordMatchingMode optional
Values can be either ‘SmartMatch’, ‘ExactMatch’, or ‘None’.
password optional
Password of the PDF file, The input must be in string format.
regexSearch optional
Must be one of: true, or false.
async optional
Set async to true for long processes to run in the background, API will then return a jobId which you can use with /job/check endpoint to check the status of the process and retrieve the output while you can proceed with other tasks without waiting for this process to finish.
IMPORTANT: Also set the inline param to true to get a direct link to the final output pdf in both sync and async modes. Otherwise, you will be getting a direct link to pdf in sync mode but also a link to the .json file in the async mode.
profiles optional
Use this parameter to set additional configurations for fine-tuning and extra options. Explore PDF.co knowledgebase for profile examples, The input must be in string format.
  • Method: POST
  • URL: /v1/pdf/find

Query parameters

No query parameters accepted.

Body payload

{
    "async": "false",
    "url": "pdfco-test-files.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.compdf-to-text/sample.pdf",
    "searchString": "Invoice Date \\d+/\\d+/\\d+",
    "regexSearch": "true",
    "name": "output",
    "pages": "0-",
    "inline": "true",
    "wordMatchingMode": "",
    "password": ""
}

Example responses

/pdf/find
{
    "body": [
        {
            "text": "Invoice Date 01/01/2016",
            "left": 436.5400085449219,
            "top": 130.4599995137751,
            "width": 122.85311957550027,
            "height": 11.040000486224898,
            "pageIndex": 0,
            "bounds": {
                "location": {
                    "isEmpty": false,
                    "x": 436.54,
                    "y": 130.46
                },
                "size": "122.853119, 11.0400009",
                "x": 436.54,
                "y": 130.46,
                "width": 122.853119,
                "height": 11.0400009,
                "left": 436.54,
                "top": 130.46,
                "right": 559.3931,
                "bottom": 141.5,
                "isEmpty": false
            },
            "elementCount": 1,
            "elements": [
                {
                    "index": 0,
                    "left": 436.5400085449219,
                    "top": 130.4599995137751,
                    "width": 122.85311957550027,
                    "height": 11.040000486224898,
                    "angle": 0,
                    "text": "Invoice Date 01/01/2016",
                    "isNewLine": true,
                    "fontIsBold": true,
                    "fontIsItalic": false,
                    "fontName": "Helvetica-Bold",
                    "fontSize": 11,
                    "fontColor": "0, 0, 0",
                    "fontColorAsOleColor": 0,
                    "fontColorAsHtmlColor": "#000000",
                    "bounds": {
                        "location": {
                            "isEmpty": false,
                            "x": 436.54,
                            "y": 130.46
                        },
                        "size": "122.853119, 11.0400009",
                        "x": 436.54,
                        "y": 130.46,
                        "width": 122.853119,
                        "height": 11.0400009,
                        "left": 436.54,
                        "top": 130.46,
                        "right": 559.3931,
                        "bottom": 141.5,
                        "isEmpty": false
                    }
                }
            ]
        }
    ],
    "pageCount": 1,
    "error": false,
    "status": 200,
    "name": "output",
    "remainingCredits": 59970
}

Code Snippet

CURL
curl --location --request POST 'https://api.pdf.co/v1/pdf/find' \
--header 'x-api-key: ' \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
--data-raw '{
    "async": "false",
    "url": "pdfco-test-files.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.compdf-to-text/sample.pdf",
    "searchString": "Invoice Date \\d+/\\d+/\\d+",
    "regexSearch": "true",
    "name": "output",
    "pages": "0-",
    "inline": "true",
    "wordMatchingMode": "",
    "password": ""
}'

Samples