Rhino PDF Export for Obsidian

Export Markdown notes to beautifully styled PDFs with configurable themes: colors, logo, header/footer, watermark, PDF bookmarks, legal notice.

What's new in 1.3.0

Configuration is now layered: the theme carries the defaults, the note overrides them, the export modal has the last word.

• "This document" section in the export modal: subtitle, cover, table of contents, watermark and classification, changeable right before exporting
• "Save to note": writes those overrides into the note's frontmatter, so a one-off tweak becomes reproducible
• theme: frontmatter key: pin a base theme per note
• order: frontmatter key: sort chapters in a merged export, without 01- filename prefixes
• Embedded fonts: point a theme at font files in your vault and they are inlined into the PDF. Family, weight and style are read from the file itself; "Import from folder" configures a whole family in one click
• Fully offline: fonts are bundled, exporting makes no network request
• Quick export command: no dialog, straight to a PDF next to the note
• Duplicate any theme, built-ins included

⚠️ Breaking: rhino-pdf frontmatter must now be valid YAML — quote values containing {, : or #. See the changelog.

Features

• Built-in themes: Minimal (clean, serif)
• Custom themes: create and configure your own themes (colors, logo, fonts, margins, legal notice)
• Theme import/export: share themes as JSON files
• Theme persistence: custom themes are stored in .obsidian/rhino-pdf-themes.json, outside the plugin folder (survives plugin updates)
• Live preview: PDF preview in the export modal before generating
• Batch export: export all notes in a folder with one click (right-click on folder)
• Merge mode: combine all notes in a folder into a single PDF with a full table of contents
• Table of contents: auto-generated from H2/H3 headings, clickable, with page numbers and customizable title
• Heading numbering: optional automatic numbering of H2/H3 (1, 1.1, …), synced with the table of contents
• External links: optionally show link URLs inline or as page footnotes
• YAML frontmatter: override theme settings per note via the rhino-pdf key, including which theme to use
• Export overrides: change subtitle, cover, TOC, watermark and classification in the export modal, then save them to the note or to the theme
• Obsidian callouts: full callout rendering with colors and icons (all standard types + Callout Manager compatibility)
• Watermark: optional text watermark on every page (configurable text, color, opacity, font size, rotation)
• Dynamic headers/footers: header, footer and classification text support {title}, {filename}, {author}, {date}, {time} and {fm.key} (any frontmatter field), resolved at export time
• PDF bookmarks: clickable outline (H1/H2/H3) generated automatically in the PDF, visible in any PDF reader's sidebar
• PDF metadata (optional, per theme): title/author/subject/keywords written into the document properties, read from the note frontmatter
• Classification banner: optional text (e.g. "RESTRICTED") centered on every page, including the cover
• Manual page breaks: insert <!-- pagebreak --> in a note to force a new page
• Automatic page breaks: optionally start a new page before every H1/H2/H3 (per theme)
• Cover info block: pick frontmatter fields (author, date, …) to list in a table on the cover, via checkboxes in the export modal; persisted per note (coverInfo) or per theme
• Merge ordering: sort notes of a merged export with the order frontmatter key
• Quick export: "Export note as PDF with last settings" skips the modal entirely
• Edit theme shortcut: "Edit theme" button in the export modal opens the theme editor without losing your overrides
• Logo: displayed on cover page + small version in the top-right corner of subsequent pages
• Pagination: configurable footer format ({page} / {pages}, via paged.js CSS counters)
• Legal notice: optional block at the end of the document
• CSS Paged Media: rendered via paged.js (running headers, margin boxes, page counters)
• Embedded fonts: reference font files from your vault (woff2, woff, ttf, otf) and they are inlined into the PDF — same rendering on every machine, even if the font is not installed
• Offline: paged.js and the Inter / JetBrains Mono fonts are bundled locally. Exporting never touches the network, so a document can be exported air-gapped and the act of exporting it leaks nothing

Installation

From Obsidian

Settings → Community plugins → Browse → search "Rhino PDF Export" → Install → Enable. Or get it there : https://community.obsidian.md/plugins/rhino-pdf-export

Manual

Download main.js, manifest.json and styles.css from the latest release, then copy them into your vault at .obsidian/plugins/rhino-pdf-export/.

From source

git clone https://github.com/degun-osint/obsidian-rhino-pdf-export.git
cd obsidian-rhino-pdf-export
npm install && npm run build
cp main.js manifest.json styles.css /path/to/vault/.obsidian/plugins/rhino-pdf-export/

Usage

• Command palette: Export note as PDF, or Export note as PDF with last settings to skip the modal
• Right-click on a .md file → Export note as PDF
• Right-click on a folder → Export folder as PDF

The export modal shows a live PDF preview, lets you pick the theme, and opens a "This document" section for the settings you want to change just this once.

For folder export, a toggle lets you merge all notes into a single PDF with a global table of contents.

Where settings live

Three layers, resolved in this order — the export modal wins, then the note, then the theme:

Layer	Holds	Edited in
Theme	The charter: colors, fonts, logo, margins, page size, legal notice	Settings → theme editor
Note	What is specific to this document: subtitle, watermark, classification, cover info	The rhino-pdf frontmatter key
Export	A one-off change, before hitting Export	The "This document" section

Two buttons bridge the layers. Save to note writes the modal's overrides into the note's frontmatter — that is how a one-off tweak becomes reproducible. Save as theme default promotes them to the theme instead, duplicating it first if it is built-in.

YAML frontmatter

Add a rhino-pdf block in a note's frontmatter to override theme settings:

---
rhino-pdf:
  theme: "Corporate Report"      # pin a theme, by name or id
  primaryColor: "#e63946"
  showCover: false
  subtitle: "My subtitle"
  watermarkText: "DRAFT"
  headerText: "{title} — {date}"
  classificationText: "RESTRICTED"
  pageBreakBeforeH2: true
  coverInfo: [author, case_id]   # cover info block for this note
  order: 2                       # position in a merged folder export
  margins:
    top: 30mm
    bottom: 30mm
---

Every theme field is supported except id, name and builtin — a note must not be able to rename the theme it resolves against.

Values must be valid YAML. Quote anything containing {, : or #, or YAML will read it as structure:

rhino-pdf:
  paginationFormat: "{page} / {pages}"   # quoted — `{` would open a flow mapping
  primaryColor: "#e63946"                # quoted — `#` would start a comment

Unknown or invalid keys are ignored rather than applied, and the export modal shows a badge listing them.

Help & reference

Text variables

Header, footer and classification text resolve these placeholders at export time:

Variable	Value
{title}	Note title (first # H1, or filename)
{filename}	Note file name (without extension)
{author}	Frontmatter author field
{date}	Export date (locale format)
{time}	Export time (locale format)
{fm.KEY}	Any frontmatter field, e.g. {fm.case_id}

Manual page break

Put this on its own line anywhere in a note to force a new page:

<!-- pagebreak -->

Automatic page breaks

In the theme editor (Page layout → "Page breaks"), toggle Before heading 1/2/3 to start a new page before every heading of that level. Cover and table-of-contents headings are never affected.

Set pageBreakBeforeH2: true in a note's frontmatter and it applies to that note only, including inside a merged folder export.

Merge order

In a merged folder export, notes are sorted by their rhino-pdf.order frontmatter key, then alphabetically. Notes without one come last.

---
rhino-pdf:
  order: 1
---

Quick export

Export note as PDF with last settings exports without opening the modal. It uses the theme pinned by the note's rhino-pdf.theme, falling back to the last theme you used, and writes to the folder of your last export (or next to the note). It overwrites an existing PDF of the same name without asking — the destination is shown in the notice.

Classification banner

Set Classification text in the theme editor (or classificationText in frontmatter) to print a centered banner on every page, cover included. It supports the text variables above, so DIFFUSION RESTREINTE — {fm.case_id} works. Color is configurable.

PDF metadata

Enable PDF metadata in the theme editor to fill the generated PDF's document properties from the note frontmatter (off by default):

PDF property	Frontmatter field
Title	note title
Author	author
Subject	subject
Keywords	keywords or tags

Cover info block

In the export modal, under This document → Cover info block, each frontmatter field of the note appears as a checkbox. Tick the ones you want and they are listed as a label/value table on the cover page (requires a theme with a cover). Example frontmatter:

---
author: Degun
subject: OSINT report
case_id: AFFAIRE-2026-0042
tags: [osint, report]
---

The selection is remembered where you save it: Save to note writes coverInfo: [author, case_id] into the note, and Save as theme default stores it as the theme's coverInfoFields, applied to every note exported with it.

Embedded fonts

A font named in Body font / Code font must be installed on the machine running the export, or it falls back silently. To avoid that, drop the font files in your vault and reference them under Settings → theme → Embedded fonts: they get inlined into the PDF, so the document renders identically everywhere.

Drop your font files in the vault, then either:

• Import from folder — pick the folder and every font in it becomes a row, ready to use;
• Add font file — start typing a path, pick from the suggestions.

Either way the family, weight and style are read from the font file itself, not guessed from its name. Variable fonts are detected and get their real range (100 900 for Inter). Correct any field afterwards if you want to.

Field	Example
Family	Marianne
File	assets/fonts/Marianne-Regular.woff2
Weight	400, or 100 900 for a variable font
Style	Normal / Italic

Add one row per weight and style you actually use — with only a regular file, the bold is synthesized by the renderer and it shows in print. Then use the family in the font fields: 'Marianne', sans-serif.

Supported formats are woff2 (recommended), woff, ttf and otf. Font collections (.ttc) are not supported — @font-face cannot use them. An embedded family takes precedence over a system font of the same name. If a file is missing or invalid, the export tells you rather than quietly falling back.

Inter and JetBrains Mono are already bundled with the plugin — no need to add them.

External links

The External links theme option controls how external (http/https) link addresses are rendered:

• Keep as links — unchanged (clickable, address hidden)
• Show inline — appends (https://…) after the link text
• As footnote — moves the address to a numbered footnote at the bottom of the page

Pagination format

The footer page number uses a template with {page} and {pages}, so you can set e.g. {page} / {pages}, Page {page} of {pages} or - {page} -.

Heading numbering

Enable Number headings in the theme editor to automatically prefix H2/H3 with 1, 1.1, … The numbering is computed at print time and stays in sync with the table of contents.

Clickable table of contents

Table-of-contents entries link to their heading and are clickable in the exported PDF (in addition to the PDF bookmarks/outline shown in a reader's sidebar).

Callouts

All standard Obsidian callout types are supported with their colors and icons:

note, abstract/summary/tldr, info, tip/hint/important, success/check/done, question/help/faq, warning/caution/attention, failure/fail/missing, danger/error, bug, example, quote/cite

Nested callouts are supported. Custom callouts from the Callout Manager plugin are also supported (colors via CSS custom properties) — custom icons are not carried over, but styling (color, background) is preserved.

Theme Configuration

Settings → Rhino PDF Export:

• Browse built-in themes
• Duplicate any theme, built-ins included, to start from it
• Create / edit / delete custom themes
• Import / export themes as JSON
• Per theme: colors, logo (vault path), cover page, subtitle, cover info block, table of contents (+ custom title), heading numbering, header logo, header text, pagination format, footer text, external link display, classification banner (text + color), watermark (text, color, opacity, size, rotation), legal notice, PDF metadata, fonts, embedded font files, font size, page size, orientation, margins, page break before headings (H1/H2/H3)
• Header/footer/classification text support variables (see Help & reference)

Development

npm install
npm run dev     # watch mode
npm run build   # production

Structure

src/
├── main.ts           # Entry point, commands and context menus
├── types.ts          # PdfTheme, DocConfig, CustomFont, PluginSettings
├── themes.ts         # Built-in themes + factory + duplication
├── settings.ts       # Settings tab (theme editor, JSON import/export)
├── modal.ts          # Export modal with live preview
├── batch.ts          # Batch export (full folder)
├── doc-config-ui.ts  # "This document" overrides section, shared by both modals
├── frontmatter.ts    # rhino-pdf validation + theme resolution
├── export.ts         # Shared note → PDF pipeline + asset cache
├── font-meta.ts      # sfnt/woff/woff2 parser: family, weight, style
├── font-picker.ts    # Vault font autocomplete + folder import
├── render.ts         # HTML + CSS Paged Media generation
├── pdf.ts            # Electron BrowserWindow + printToPDF
└── vendor/
    ├── paged.polyfill.txt   # paged.js v0.4.3 bundled
    ├── inter.css            # Inter, woff2 inlined as data URIs
    └── jetbrains-mono.css   # JetBrains Mono, same

scripts/
└── vendor-fonts.mjs  # Regenerates the two vendored stylesheets

Fonts are vendored, not fetched. node scripts/vendor-fonts.mjs re-downloads Inter and JetBrains Mono from Google Fonts, keeps the latin and latin-ext subsets, and inlines each woff2 as a data URI. Both are variable fonts, so one @font-face per subset carries a font-weight range.

Tech Stack

• TypeScript + esbuild
• Obsidian API (MarkdownRenderer, Plugin, Modal, SettingTab)
• paged.js v0.4.3 (CSS Paged Media polyfill, bundled locally)
• pdf-lib (PDF bookmarks/outline generation)
• Electron BrowserWindow + printToPDF

Acknowledgments

Inspired by Better Export PDF.

This plugin bundles and redistributes the following MIT-licensed libraries:

• paged.js v0.4.3 — CSS Paged Media polyfill © 2018 Adam Hyde
• pdf-lib v1.17.1 — PDF generation © 2019 Andrew Dillon

And the following typefaces, under the SIL Open Font License 1.1:

• Inter © 2016 The Inter Project Authors
• JetBrains Mono © 2020 The JetBrains Mono Project Authors

Their full license texts are reproduced in THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md.

License

GPLv3