How to Generate PDFs from HTML in Node.js: wkhtmltopdf vs Puppeteer vs API

You need to generate PDFs in your Node.js app. Invoices, reports, certificates, contracts. You search "Node.js HTML to PDF" and find two solutions: wkhtmltopdf — "Lightweight, easy to set up" Puppeteer — "Just use Puppeteer, it can do anything" You pick one. Three days later, you're debugging font rendering, broken CSS, memory leaks, and system dependencies. There's a simpler way. Let me show you all three approaches so you can decide which one actually works. The wkhtmltopdf Approach wkhtmltopdf is a command-line tool that converts HTML to PDF using WebKit. Here's the basic setup: # Install wkhtmltopdf apt-get install wkhtmltopdf # In Node.js npm install wkhtmltopdf Then use it: const wkhtmltopdf = require ( ' wkhtmltopdf ' ); const fs = require ( ' fs ' ); wkhtmltopdf ( ' <h1>Hello World</h1> ' , ( err , stream ) => { if ( err ) return console . error ( err ); stream . pipe ( fs . createWriteStream ( ' invoice.pdf ' )); }); Looks simple. But this is where pain begins. The Problems St