Stirling PDF — Self-Hosted PDF Editor & Toolkit

What it is

Stirling PDF is an open-source, self-hosted web application for performing PDF operations. It handles merging, splitting, converting, compressing, OCR, signing, and editing PDFs through a browser-based interface. No data leaves your server, making it suitable for environments with strict data privacy requirements.

Teams handling sensitive documents, IT administrators looking for a self-hosted alternative to cloud PDF tools, and developers who need PDF processing in their infrastructure will find Stirling PDF practical. It runs as a Docker container with a web UI accessible from any browser.

How it saves time or tokens

Cloud PDF services charge per document or per user and require uploading files to third-party servers. Stirling PDF eliminates both costs -- there are no per-document fees and no data leaves your network. The web UI provides all common PDF operations in one place, removing the need for multiple tools or command-line utilities like qpdf, ghostscript, or pdftk.

How to use

1. Deploy with Docker:

docker run -d --name stirling-pdf -p 8080:8080 \
  -v stirling-data:/usr/share/tessdata \
  frooodle/s-pdf:latest

1. Open http://localhost:8080 in your browser.
2. Select the operation you need (merge, split, convert, OCR, etc.) from the web UI.
3. Upload your PDF files, configure options, and download the result.

Example

# Docker Compose with persistent storage and OCR language packs
version: '3.8'
services:
  stirling-pdf:
    image: frooodle/s-pdf:latest
    ports:
      - '8080:8080'
    volumes:
      - ./tessdata:/usr/share/tessdata
      - ./configs:/configs
      - ./logs:/logs
    environment:
      DOCKER_ENABLE_SECURITY: 'false'
      LANGS: 'en_GB,de_DE,fr_FR'

# API usage for automation
curl -X POST http://localhost:8080/api/v1/general/merge \
  -F 'fileInput=@file1.pdf' \
  -F 'fileInput=@file2.pdf' \
  -o merged.pdf

Related on TokRepo

• Document Processing Tools -- explore tools for document handling and processing
• Self-Hosted Tools -- discover self-hosted alternatives to cloud services

Common pitfalls

• OCR requires Tesseract language data files. The default image includes English only. Mount additional language packs to the tessdata volume for other languages.
• Large PDF files (100+ MB) can consume significant memory during processing. Allocate sufficient Docker memory limits for heavy workloads.
• The API endpoints use multipart form uploads. Ensure your client handles file boundaries correctly when automating PDF operations.