Getting Started

Maven

To use the latest release you'll need to add the following dependency:

<dependency>
  <groupId>org.apache.pdfbox</groupId>
  <artifactId>pdfbox</artifactId>
  <version>3.0.0</version>
</dependency>

PDFBox and Java 8

Important notice when using PDFBox with Java 8 before 1.8.0_191 or Java 9 before 9.0.4

Due to the change of the java color management module towards "LittleCMS", users can experience slow performance in color operations. A solution is to disable LittleCMS in favor of the old KCMS (Kodak Color Management System) by:

• Starting with -Dsun.java2d.cmm=sun.java2d.cmm.kcms.KcmsServiceProvider or
• Calling System.setProperty("sun.java2d.cmm", "sun.java2d.cmm.kcms.KcmsServiceProvider")

Sources: https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8041125

Rendering Performance

Since PDFBox 2.0.4

PDFBox 2.0.4 introduced a new command line setting

-Dorg.apache.pdfbox.rendering.UsePureJavaCMYKConversion=true

which may improve the performance of rendering PDFs on some systems especially if there are a lot of images on a page.