# How to Display Binary PDF Data in a Web Embedding? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ask for Help\ **Created:** [June 20, 2025, 9:57am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625 "2025-06-20T09:57:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Namra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Namra](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Namra)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2025, 9:57am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/1 "2025-06-20T09:57:15Z")
Hello Everyone, I am receiving the binary data of a PDF using `callAPI`. Is there a way to display this in a web embedding? Either by converting the binary data into a PDF format as embedding it directly not working. Any guidance would be appreciated! ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/uploads/glideapps/original/3X/f/1/f1c2db6024975b035bd538535f5d973809ec95fe.jpeg) ---
**Author:** ![MaximeBaker](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/maximebaker/32/80877_2.png) [@MaximeBaker](https://community.glideapps.com/u/MaximeBaker)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2025, 11:51am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/2 "2025-06-20T11:51:17Z")
Oh I tried that so hard! Wasn’t able to make it uploadable even with an API capable of receiving raw binary file in raw text body. Glide adds \n for break line so it corrupt files. ---
**Author:** ![Namra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Namra](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Namra)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2025, 12:48pm UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/3 "2025-06-20T12:48:55Z")
So, basically there is no way to read binary files and display them in web embeddings? ---
**Author:** ![MaximeBaker](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/maximebaker/32/80877_2.png) [@MaximeBaker](https://community.glideapps.com/u/MaximeBaker)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2025, 9:57pm UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/4 "2025-06-20T21:57:48Z")
I’m not saying it is impossible. I’m saying that even with a lot of effort, i wasn’t able to do it. ---
**Author:** ![Robert\_Petitto](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/robert_petitto/32/25193_2.png) [@Robert\_Petitto](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Robert_Petitto)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2025, 5:16pm UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/5 "2025-06-21T17:16:27Z")
It’s possible. Only problem is that it can cause your app to be very sluggish. If you have lots of binary data. Here’s how I do it: 1. Binary to base64 2. Template column to render the “link” 3. Display in a webview component ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/uploads/glideapps/original/3X/d/2/d26a6b195392b670ef2405fa352722c6950eccdd.jpeg) ---
**Author:** ![MaximeBaker](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/maximebaker/32/80877_2.png) [@MaximeBaker](https://community.glideapps.com/u/MaximeBaker)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2025, 3:39am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/6 "2025-06-22T03:39:02Z")
@Robert_Petitto did you ever try to call an API with this in the body? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Murphy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/darren_murphy/32/47326_2.png) [@Darren\_Murphy](https://community.glideapps.com/u/Darren_Murphy)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2025, 3:29pm UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/7 "2025-06-22T15:29:48Z")
I do something similar to Bob. I need to interface with an external API that returns binary PDF files. Because the Glide API can’t handle these, I use Make to fetch them, then push them in through the Glide API as base64 encoded text, and then display them in a Webview as a dataURI. ---
**Author:** ![MaximeBaker](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.glideapps.com/maximebaker/32/80877_2.png) [@MaximeBaker](https://community.glideapps.com/u/MaximeBaker)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2025, 1:41am UTC](https://community.glideapps.com/t/how-to-display-binary-pdf-data-in-a-web-embedding/82625/8 "2025-06-23T01:41:59Z")
Wow, I did not think about that! Thank you!