PDF ──> pdfmux router ──> best extractor per page ──> audit ──> re-extract failures ──> Markdown / JSON / chunks
            |
            ├─ PyMuPDF         (digital text, 0.01s/page)
            ├─ OpenDataLoader  (complex layouts, 0.05s/page)
            ├─ RapidOCR        (scanned pages, CPU-only)
            ├─ Docling          (tables, 97.9% TEDS)
            ├─ Surya            (heavy OCR fallback)
            └─ YOUR LLM        (Gemini / Claude / GPT-4o / Ollama — BYOK via 5-line YAML)

pip install pdfmux

pip install "pdfmux[ocr]"             # RapidOCR — scanned/image pages (~200MB, CPU-only)
pip install "pdfmux[tables]"          # Docling — table-heavy docs (~500MB)
pip install "pdfmux[opendataloader]"  # OpenDataLoader — complex layouts (Java 11+)
pip install "pdfmux[llm]"            # LLM fallback — Gemini, Claude, GPT-4o, Ollama
pip install "pdfmux[all]"            # everything

# zero config — just works
pdfmux convert invoice.pdf
# invoice.pdf -> invoice.md (2 pages, 95% confidence, via pymupdf4llm)

# RAG-ready chunks with token limits
pdfmux convert report.pdf --chunk --max-tokens 500

# cost-aware extraction with budget cap
pdfmux convert report.pdf --mode economy --budget 0.50

# schema-guided structured extraction (5 built-in presets)
pdfmux convert invoice.pdf --schema invoice

# BYOK any LLM for hardest pages
pdfmux convert scan.pdf --llm-provider claude

# batch a directory
pdfmux convert ./docs/ -o ./output/

import pdfmux

# text -> markdown
text = pdfmux.extract_text("report.pdf")

# structured data -> dict with tables, key-values, metadata
data = pdfmux.extract_json("report.pdf")

# RAG chunks -> list of dicts with token estimates
chunks = pdfmux.chunk("report.pdf", max_tokens=500)

                           ┌─────────────────────────────┐
                           │     Segment Detector         │
                           │  text / tables / images /    │
                           │  formulas / headers per page │
                           └─────────────┬───────────────┘
                                         │
                    ┌────────────────────────────────────────┐
                    │            Router Engine                │
                    │                                        │
                    │   economy ── balanced ── premium        │
                    │   (minimize $)  (default)  (max quality)│
                    │   budget caps: --budget 0.50            │
                    └────────────────────┬───────────────────┘
                                         │
          ┌──────────┬──────────┬────────┴────────┬──────────┐
          │          │          │                  │          │
     PyMuPDF   OpenData    RapidOCR           Docling     LLM
     digital   Loader      scanned            tables    (BYOK)
     0.01s/pg  complex     CPU-only           97.9%    any provider
               layouts                        TEDS
          │          │          │                  │          │
          └──────────┴──────────┴────────┬────────┴──────────┘
                                         │
                    ┌────────────────────────────────────────┐
                    │           Quality Auditor               │
                    │                                        │
                    │   4-signal dynamic confidence scoring   │
                    │   per-page: good / bad / empty          │
                    │   if bad -> re-extract with next backend│
                    └────────────────────┬───────────────────┘
                                         │
                    ┌────────────────────────────────────────┐
                    │           Output Pipeline               │
                    │                                        │
                    │   heading injection (font-size analysis)│
                    │   table extraction + normalization      │
                    │   text cleanup + merge                  │
                    │   confidence score (honest, not inflated)│
                    └────────────────────────────────────────┘

pdfmux convert <file-or-dir> [options]

Options:
  -o, --output PATH          Output file or directory
  -f, --format FORMAT        markdown | json | csv | llm (default: markdown)
  -q, --quality QUALITY      fast | standard | high (default: standard)
  -s, --schema SCHEMA        JSON schema file or preset (invoice, receipt, contract, resume, paper)
  --chunk                    Output RAG-ready chunks
  --max-tokens N             Max tokens per chunk (default: 500)
  --mode MODE                economy | balanced | premium (default: balanced)
  --budget AMOUNT            Max spend per document in USD
  --llm-provider PROVIDER    LLM backend: gemini | claude | openai | ollama
  --confidence               Include confidence score in output
  --stdout                   Print to stdout instead of file

pdfmux serve              # stdio mode (Claude Desktop, Cursor)
pdfmux serve --http 8080  # HTTP mode

pdfmux doctor
# ┌──────────────────┬─────────────┬─────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
# │ Extractor        │ Status      │ Version │ Install                          │
# ├──────────────────┼─────────────┼─────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
# │ PyMuPDF          │ installed   │ 1.25.3  │                                  │
# │ OpenDataLoader   │ installed   │ 0.3.1   │                                  │
# │ RapidOCR         │ installed   │ 3.0.6   │                                  │
# │ Docling          │ missing     │ --      │ pip install pdfmux[tables]       │
# │ Surya            │ missing     │ --      │ pip install pdfmux[ocr-heavy]    │
# │ LLM (Gemini)     │ configured  │ --      │ GEMINI_API_KEY set               │
# └──────────────────┴─────────────┴─────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘

pdfmux benchmark report.pdf
# ┌──────────────────┬────────┬────────────┬─────────────┬──────────────────────┐
# │ Extractor        │   Time │ Confidence │      Output │ Status               │
# ├──────────────────┼────────┼────────────┼─────────────┼──────────────────────┤
# │ PyMuPDF          │  0.02s │        95% │ 3,241 chars │ all pages good       │
# │ Multi-pass       │  0.03s │        95% │ 3,241 chars │ all pages good       │
# │ RapidOCR         │  4.20s │        88% │ 2,891 chars │ ok                   │
# │ OpenDataLoader   │  0.12s │        97% │ 3,310 chars │ best                 │
# └──────────────────┴────────┴────────────┴─────────────┴──────────────────────┘

import pdfmux

text = pdfmux.extract_text("report.pdf")                    # -> str (markdown)
text = pdfmux.extract_text("report.pdf", quality="fast")    # PyMuPDF only, instant
text = pdfmux.extract_text("report.pdf", quality="high")    # LLM-assisted

data = pdfmux.extract_json("report.pdf")
# data["page_count"]   -> 12
# data["confidence"]   -> 0.91
# data["ocr_pages"]    -> [2, 5, 8]
# data["pages"][0]["key_values"]  -> [{"key": "Date", "value": "2026-02-28"}]
# data["pages"][0]["tables"]      -> [{"headers": [...], "rows": [...]}]

chunks = pdfmux.chunk("report.pdf", max_tokens=500)
for c in chunks:
    print(f"{c['title']}: {c['tokens']} tokens (pages {c['page_start']}-{c['page_end']})")

data = pdfmux.extract_json("invoice.pdf", schema="invoice")
# Uses built-in invoice preset: extracts date, vendor, line items, totals
# Also accepts a path to a custom JSON Schema file

from pdfmux.extractors import get_extractor

ext = get_extractor("fast")
for page in ext.extract("large-500-pages.pdf"):  # Iterator[PageResult]
    process(page.text)  # constant memory, even on 500-page PDFs

from pdfmux import (
    # Enums
    Quality,              # FAST, STANDARD, HIGH
    OutputFormat,         # MARKDOWN, JSON, CSV, LLM
    PageQuality,          # GOOD, BAD, EMPTY

    # Data objects (frozen dataclasses)
    PageResult,           # page: text, page_num, confidence, quality, extractor
    DocumentResult,       # document: pages, source, confidence, extractor_used
    Chunk,                # chunk: title, text, page_start, page_end, tokens

    # Errors
    PdfmuxError,          # base -- catch this for all pdfmux errors
    FileError,            # file not found, unreadable, not a PDF
    ExtractionError,      # extraction failed
    ExtractorNotAvailable,# requested backend not installed
    FormatError,          # invalid output format
    AuditError,           # audit could not complete
)

pip install langchain-pdfmux

from langchain_pdfmux import PDFMuxLoader

loader = PDFMuxLoader("report.pdf", quality="standard")
docs = loader.load()  # -> list[Document] with confidence metadata

pip install llama-index-readers-pdfmux

from llama_index.readers.pdfmux import PDFMuxReader

reader = PDFMuxReader(quality="standard")
docs = reader.load_data("report.pdf")  # -> list[Document]

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "pdfmux": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "pdfmux-mcp"]
    }
  }
}

claude mcp add pdfmux -- npx -y pdfmux-mcp

# ~/.pdfmux/llm.yaml
provider: claude          # gemini | claude | openai | ollama | any OpenAI-compatible
model: claude-sonnet-4-20250514
api_key: ${ANTHROPIC_API_KEY}
base_url: https://api.anthropic.com  # optional, for custom endpoints
max_cost_per_page: 0.02   # budget cap

Page 4: 32% confidence. 0 chars extracted from image-heavy page.
  -> Install pdfmux[ocr] for RapidOCR support on 6 image-heavy pages.

git clone https://github.com/NameetP/pdfmux.git
cd pdfmux
python3.12 -m venv .venv && source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e ".[dev]"

pytest              # 151 tests
ruff check src/ tests/
ruff format src/ tests/