Puppeteer vs API: The True Cost of Generating PDFs

The "Free" Open Source Trap

"Why pay for an API when Puppeteer is free?"

This is the most common question we hear. And yes, the library is free. But your time and your servers are not. See the engineering challenges of Headless Chrome to understand why it's expensive.

The Breakdown

Option A: Self-Hosted Microservice

• Infrastructure: You need a machine with at least 2GB RAM (Chrome crashes on t2.micro).
  • Cost: ~$20/mo (DigitalOcean/AWS).
• Maintenance: Chrome updates break things. Docker resizing. Debugging "Protocol Error: Target Closed".
  • Cost: 2-4 developer hours/month. @ $50/hr = ~$150/mo.
• Total Monthly Cost: ~$170/mo + stress.

Option B: pdfmyhtml API

• Infrastructure: None.
• Maintenance: None.
• Cost:
  • Hobby: $0 (50 credits).
  • Kickstart: $5/mo (150 credits + support).

The Verdict

Unless you are generating millions of PDFs where bulk infrastructure efficiencies kick in, self-hosting is almost always more expensive. Compare our $5 starter pack to the $170/mo server cost.

For 99% of startups and agencies, offloading this "undifferentiated heavy lifting" to a specialized API is the rational economic choice.

See our Pre-paid Credit Packs and stop managing headless browsers.