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Conversion Nodes Reference

Technical reference for `convertPdf` and the dedicated format-conversion nodes such as PDF-to-Word, Excel-to-PDF, and Image-to-PDF.

Updated 2 min read

Overview

ConvertUniverse exposes two conversion patterns:

  • convertPdf: a general PDF-to-other-format node
  • dedicated conversion nodes: imageToPdf, pdfToImage, wordToPdf, pdfToWord, excelToPdf, pdfToExcel, pptToPdf, pdfToPpt

Configuration / Settings

NodeSettingTypeRequiredDetails
convertPdfformatdocx, xlsx, pptx, jpg, png, pdfaYesRoutes PDF input to the matching conversion endpoint.
pdfToImage / pdfToJpgformat, qualitystring, numberNoOutput format defaults to JPEG with quality 90.
Other dedicated nodesnone or format-specific defaultsN/ANoThe node type itself determines the route and supported file types.

Inputs Expected

Node familyExpected input
convertPdf, pdfToImage, pdfToWord, pdfToExcel, pdfToPptPDF files
imageToPdfJPG, JPEG, PNG, WebP, GIF
wordToPdfDOC or DOCX
excelToPdfXLS or XLSX
pptToPdfPPT or PPTX

Variables Exported / Outputs

Output shape: Blob[]

  • The conversion executor validates MIME types before sending the file to the API route.
  • Conversion outputs remain file objects, so downstream structured variables usually come from later parsing nodes rather than directly from the conversion node.

Common Use Cases

  • Convert incoming PDFs to DOCX before emailing them.
  • Turn a slide deck into PDF and immediately upload it to Drive.
  • Convert each page of a PDF to images, then bundle them into a ZIP or email attachment.

Edge Cases

  • convertPdf exposes pdfa in the selector, but the current codebase does not include a dedicated pdf-to-pdfa route. Treat that target as not yet production-ready.
  • pdfToImage produces one image per page, so large PDFs can create large output arrays.
  • Dedicated conversion nodes are stricter than the generic upload filter because MIME validation happens in the executor before the request is sent.