AIIPWorld as a Microlink alternative for PDFs and screenshots

Microlink alternative: what to compare

If you are looking for a Microlink alternative, the first question is what you need the job to do. Microlink turns a URL into structured data through one endpoint, and it covers metadata, screenshots, PDFs, link previews, logos, and more. AIIPWorld is a render API for two jobs only: PDF generation from HTML or a public address, and screenshots. If you need both kinds of output from HTML or a web page, this page will help you compare them. If you need metadata or link previews, Microlink covers that and we do not.

The comparison facts below come from Microlink's own pages (pricing, API overview, and PDF parameters), checked on 2026-10-12. The table above lists those facts. We do not describe Microlink beyond what those pages say. Our own details come from our documentation and code on the same date. Plan numbers may change, so check the current pricing pages before you commit.

Microlink pricing in short

Microlink's pricing is built around requests. Its pricing page shows a Free plan at $0 a month with 25 requests a day, and no API key or credit card needed. The Pro plan is $49 a month, with about $1.07 per 1,000 requests and 46,000 requests a month. Business and Enterprise prices are not listed. Business has a monthly quota aligned to your usage, and Enterprise has a custom quota.

Dividing the Pro price by its monthly request count gives a rough figure: $49 divided by 46,000 requests is about $0.001 per request. This is plain division, and it is not the same as the per-1,000 price the page shows. A Microlink request is also not the same as one of our renders. A Microlink request can return metadata as well, and cache hits do not count against its quota.

Microlink says there are no overage fees. At 100% of quota, requests pause until the next billing cycle or until you upgrade, and an alert arrives at 80%.

AIIPWorld uses credits. A simple render costs 1 credit. PDFs beyond 10 pages cost 1 more credit per 10 pages. Results larger than 5 MB cost more, and full page screenshots cost more (A full page screenshot costs 2 credits for an image up to 5,000 px tall, plus 1 credit for each further 5,000 px (or part of), up to 16,384 px (5 credits at most). Height is counted in output pixels, so device_scale_factor 2 doubles it. The job is reserved at 2 credits and settled on the real image height.). Our plans are Free with 100 credits a month and no card, Starter at $19 for 2,750, Pro at $59 for 10,000, Business at $149 for 30,000, and Scale at $299 for 75,000. A credit pack costs $10 for 1,400 credits that do not expire. Yearly billing is 10 months of the monthly price. Credit costs are provisional until launch.

Because the two products count different things, compare your own expected monthly volume against each plan. Do not compare the headline prices alone.

Microlink vs AIIPWorld: what each does

Microlink is a broad URL-to-data service. Its listed products include screenshots, PDFs, metadata, markdown, HTML, text, link previews, embeds, logos, file conversion, browser functions, and Search, which is available on the Pro plan only. Its metadata covers fields such as title, description, language, publisher, image, and logo. It also offers parameters for palette, embed, insights and technologies, and prerendering for client-side rendered sites. The API is built on metascraper, browserless, and mql, all under the microlinkhq organization on GitHub.

For PDFs, Microlink offers print-ready output with options for paper size, margins, and page ranges. The pdf parameter adds a pdf field to the response with a CDN-hosted link. Documented examples include format A4, margin 1cm, and scale 0.8. With pdf, the default media type is print. For screenshots, it captures PNG or JPEG images of a full page or a single element. Its screenshot section lists a P95 latency of 2.8 seconds. Adding meta=false skips metadata and speeds up non-metadata requests.

AIIPWorld does two things. It renders PDFs from HTML or from a public http or https address, and it takes PNG or JPEG screenshots. Renders run in headless Chromium inside isolated, resource-limited worker containers with a hard timeout. Our PDF options include format (A4 by default), width, height, landscape, margin per side (10 mm by default), print_background, scale, page_ranges, header and footer templates with page number spans, prefer_css_page_size, tagged PDF, outline, media (print or screen), wait_until, wait_for_selector, delay_ms, javascript, headers, user_agent, viewport, and base_url. Screenshot options include viewport, full_page, clip, device_scale_factor from 1 to 3, JPEG quality, omit_background, color_scheme, media, and wait options.

We do not have metadata extraction, link previews, embeds, logos, markdown, HTML or text extraction, browser functions, file conversion, or Search. We do not have webhooks, templates (template_id), or a batch endpoint. We have no synchronous mode, so every job is asynchronous. We do not have a cookie option. JavaScript runs by default. Each job gets a fresh browser context, and a page behind a login shows its login screen. Private networks are blocked, so we only render public addresses. We also offer free web tools without an account: HTML to PDF, URL to PDF, and website screenshot. Anonymous use of these tools needs a human check (Cloudflare Turnstile), and the output has no watermark.

How to test with your own jobs

Run the same set of real jobs through both services before you choose. Keep the list short and focused on your own pages.

• Check fonts. Our render server includes Liberation, Noto Sans and Serif, Noto CJK for Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Japanese, and Korean, Noto Color Emoji, and many other Noto scripts. Fonts from your own machine are not there. You can load others with @font-face from a public URL or a data URL.
• Check waiting. Test your pages with wait_until, wait_for_selector, and delay_ms, and confirm the output shows the final state you need.
• Check headers and footers. If you use page numbers, test header_template and footer_template with the pageNumber and totalPages spans, and check the result against your layout.
• Check login pages. If a page sits behind a login, confirm how each service handles it. Our renders show the login screen.
• Check error handling. Confirm that your code handles failed and timed-out jobs. Our credits for those jobs are returned.
• Check cost for your volume. Count your expected renders, pages, and full page screenshots per month, then price them on both plans.
• Check timing. Measure end-to-end time, including polling, on your own pages rather than relying on any published figure.

Moving from Microlink to AIIPWorld

Moving a PDF or screenshot job is a small change in code. You authenticate with an API key from the dashboard, sent as a Bearer token in the Authorization header (or in an x-api-key header). You send a POST to /v1/render on api.aiipworld.com with a JSON body. The body contains html or url, an output value (pdf, png, jpeg, or html for URL input only), and an options object.

The request returns 202 with a job_id. Poll GET /v1/jobs/:id until the status is succeeded, failed, or timeout. A succeeded job includes download_url, a short-lived signed link you can use without an API key. Plan your code around this two-step flow, because we have no synchronous mode.

Metadata calls have no direct equivalent here. If your Microlink code reads title, description, or image fields, keep that part on Microlink or move it to another tool. Batch processing and webhooks are not available, so if your code depends on them, you will need to rebuild that logic with polling in your own code.

For PDF setup, the guides HTML to PDF in Node.js, HTML to PDF in Python, and print CSS for PDF show common patterns. The PDF API, screenshot API, and documentation list the full option set.

When Microlink may suit you better

Microlink is a good fit if you need more than rendering. Its listed products cover metadata, link previews, embeds, logos, markdown, text extraction, and Search on Pro. It has a free plan that needs no API key or card, which makes early testing easy. Its Pro plan lists a 60-second timeout, configurable cache TTL from 1 minute to 31 days, custom cache keys, custom HTTP headers, automatic proxy resolution, priority email support, and a 99.9% SLA. Enterprise adds a dedicated endpoint and browser pool, dedicated CDN and storage, and a dedicated Slack channel. Its API is built on the open source projects metascraper, browserless, and mql. If your work centers on URL data, previews, or caching behavior, Microlink covers more of that ground than we do.

When AIIPWorld may suit you better

AIIPWorld may suit you if your work is limited to PDF and screenshot rendering and you want a focused render API with a free web tool option. Our PDF and screenshot options cover paper format, margins, headers and footers with page numbers, print media, wait controls, and viewport settings. Our credit model separates simple renders from larger output, and our Free plan gives 100 credits a month with no card. Free results are kept 1 day, and paid results are kept 7 days.

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