PDF Export

How It Works

honeydeck pdf renders the deck using Playwright/Chromium. It builds into a temporary directory and starts a temporary local server — no pre-existing build or dist/ pollution needed.

This keeps PDF output on the same rendering path as the browser presentation, so MDX, React components, layouts, themes, and CSS behave consistently.

If Chromium is missing or fails to launch after a fresh install, install the Playwright browser binary:

npx playwright install chromium

Usage

honeydeck pdf                          # → deck.pdf
honeydeck pdf -o my-talk.pdf           # custom filename
honeydeck pdf --steps all              # all step states as separate pages
honeydeck pdf --mode dark              # dark mode PDF
honeydeck pdf --mode light             # explicit light mode
honeydeck pdf --parallel 6             # capture up to 6 pages at a time

Options

Flag	Description	Default
`-o <file>`	Output filename	`deck.pdf`
`--steps <final\|all>`	Override `pdfSteps` frontmatter	`final`
`--mode <light\|dark>`	Override PDF color mode resolution	unset
`--parallel <count>`	Parallel page captures, from `1` to `16`	CPU count, capped at `16`

Frontmatter Settings

---
pdfColorMode: light    # light | dark
pdfSteps: final        # final | all
---

pdfColorMode — optional PDF color mode. Resolution is CLI --mode > pdfColorMode > pinned deck colorMode (light/dark) > light. system is ignored for PDF.
pdfSteps — final renders each slide once in its final state. all renders every step as a separate PDF page.

Honeydeck builds an ordered capture plan before taking screenshots. The final PDF always follows deck order; in pdfSteps: all, step pages ascend within each slide. Page screenshots may be captured in parallel, but completion order does not affect PDF page order.

When pdfSteps: all:

Each Reveal/RevealGroup step becomes a separate page. RevealWith appears on the page for its target step and adds no extra page.
Stepped code blocks show their first highlight group on the baseline page; each later code highlight group becomes a separate page.
Magic Code blocks show their first inner code fence on the baseline page; later line-highlight states and code morph states become separate pages according to the same timeline.
Reveals, stepped code blocks, Magic Code, and custom TimelineSteps blocks use the same underlying timeline.

When pdfSteps: final (default):

All reveals shown in final (visible) state.
Code blocks shown with final highlight applied.
Magic Code blocks shown at their final code state with final highlight applied.
useTimeline() and useTimelineSteps() expose isPdfFinalRender: true, so custom step-driven components can render an all-open/all-visible PDF state.

In pdfSteps: all, isPdfFinalRender stays false because each step is captured with the same timeline state the browser presentation would use.

Aspect Ratio

PDF pages follow the deck's aspectRatio. Width stays fixed at 1920 and height is derived from the ratio:

16:9 → 1920×1080
4:3  → 1920×1440
1:1  → 1920×1920

Invalid or missing ratios fall back to 16:9 / 1920×1080.

Terminal Output

  ✨ Honeydeck v0.1.0

  🖨️  Exporting PDF...
  🧵 Capturing 12 pages with N workers...
  📄 Rendering page 1/12 (slide 1/12)...
  📄 Rendering page 2/12 (slide 2/12)...
  ...
  ✅ Done! deck.pdf (12 pages)

PDF export