Use the Markit REST API to convert PDF, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and other documents to Markdown programmatically. Integrate document-to-Markdown conversion into your own applications, scripts, or CI/CD pipelines. For interactive use, try the free web converter instead.

CONFIG Conversion Settings Optional settings

Include any of these optional fields in multipart form data requests to control backend parsing behavior.

Field	Type	Default	Valid Values	Description
`do_ocr`	boolean	`true`	`true`, `false`	Run OCR on scanned pages or images inside the document.
`force_ocr`	boolean	`false`	`true`, `false`	Force OCR even when the document contains selectable text.
`table_mode`	string	`off`	`off`, `fast`, `accurate`	Table extraction mode (Docling only). `accurate` uses a slower ML-based pipeline.
`images_scale`	number	`0.5`	Positive number (e.g. `0.5`, `1`, `2`)	Resolution scale factor for images embedded in the output.
`heading_style`	string	`ATX`	`ATX`, `SETEXT`	Markdown heading style (MarkItDown only). `ATX` uses `#` prefixes; `SETEXT` uses underlines.

API Endpoint Reference

POST /api/convert Convert single document

Convert a single file to Markdown. The request must be sent as multipart/form-data.

Parameters

Field	Type	Required	Description
`file`	file	Yes	The document to convert (PDF, DOCX, PPTX, XLSX, HTML, CSV, JSON, XML, …).
`split_headers`	boolean	No	When `true`, splits the output on top-level headings and returns a ZIP archive instead of a single `.md` file.
Conversion Settings	—	No	See the Conversion Settings section above.

cURL Request

curl -X POST https://mitdown.ca/api/convert \
  -F "file=@report.pdf" \
  -F "split_headers=false"

JSON Response

{
  "conversion_status": "SUCCESS",
  "filename": "report.md",
  "download_url": "/api/download/a1b2c3d4/report.md?is_split=false",
  "is_split": false,
  "markdown": "# Report\n\nContent here…"
}

POST /api/convert/batch Convert multiple documents

Convert multiple files in a single request. The request must be sent as multipart/form-data.

Parameters

Field	Type	Required	Description
`files[]`	file[]	Yes	One or more files to convert. Repeat the field for each file.
`split_headers`	boolean	No	When `true`, each converted file is split on top-level headings.
Conversion Settings	—	No	See the Conversion Settings section above.

cURL Request

curl -X POST https://mitdown.ca/api/convert/batch \
  -F "files[]=@doc1.pdf" \
  -F "files[]=@doc2.docx" \
  -F "split_headers=false"

JSON Response

{
  "batch_id": "e5f6g7h8",
  "results": [
    {
      "filename": "doc1.md",
      "status": "SUCCESS",
      "backend_used": "docling",
      "download_url": "/api/download/batch/e5f6g7h8/doc1.md"
    },
    {
      "filename": "doc2.md",
      "status": "SUCCESS",
      "backend_used": "docling",
      "download_url": "/api/download/batch/e5f6g7h8/doc2.md"
    }
  ],
  "download_all_url": "/api/download/batch/e5f6g7h8/all"
}

GET /api/convert/current-backend Get active backend

Returns the conversion backend currently active for this session and the list of formats it supports.

cURL Request

curl https://mitdown.ca/api/convert/current-backend

JSON Response

{
  "current_backend": "markit",
  "supported_formats": ["pdf", "powerpoint", "word", "excel", "html", "json", "xml", "image", "csv", "audio", "zip", "epub", "yaml"]
}

POST /api/convert/switch-backend Switch active backend

Switch the active conversion backend for the current session. Send a JSON body.

Parameters

Field	Type	Required	Valid Values	Description
`backend`	string	Yes	`markitdown`, `docling`, `markit`	The backend to activate for subsequent conversions.

cURL Request

curl -X POST https://mitdown.ca/api/convert/switch-backend \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"backend": "docling"}'

JSON Response

{
  "message": "Successfully switched to docling backend",
  "current_backend": "docling"
}

GET /api/download/<id>/<filename> Download single conversion

Download a previously converted file by its conversion ID and filename.

Path Parameters

Parameter	Description
`id`	The 32-character `conversion_id` returned in the conversion response.
`filename`	The filename of the generated document.

Query Parameters

Parameter	Type	Description
`is_split`	boolean	Set to `true` when downloading a split headings ZIP archive.

cURL Request

curl -O "https://mitdown.ca/api/download/a1b2c3d4/report.md"

# For split output:
curl -O "https://mitdown.ca/api/download/a1b2c3d4/report.zip?is_split=true"

GET /api/download/batch/<id>/<filename> Download batch converted file

Download a single converted file from a batch conversion result.

Path Parameters

Parameter	Description
`id`	The `batch_id` returned by the batch conversion route.
`filename`	The filename of the individual converted file.

cURL Request

curl -O "https://mitdown.ca/api/download/batch/e5f6g7h8/doc1.md"

GET /api/download/batch/<id>/all Download batch zip

Download all files from a batch conversion as a single ZIP archive.

Path Parameters

Parameter	Description
`id`	The `batch_id` returned by the batch conversion route.

cURL Request

curl -O "https://mitdown.ca/api/download/batch/e5f6g7h8/all"

GET /api/history Get conversion history

Retrieve the conversion history for the current session.

cURL Request

curl https://mitdown.ca/api/history

JSON Response

{
  "conversion_history": [
    {
      "backend": "markitdown",
      "conversion_id": "a1b2c3d4",
      "download_url": "/api/download/a1b2c3d4/report.md?is_split=false",
      "filename": "report.md",
      "is_batch": false,
      "is_split": false,
      "timestamp": 1716499800000
    }
  ]
}

DELETE /api/history Clear conversion history

Clear all conversion history for the current session.

cURL Request

curl -X DELETE https://mitdown.ca/api/history

JSON Response

{
  "message": "Conversion history cleared successfully"
}