Class HtmlHeaderFooter

A HTML Header or Footer which will be printed onto every page of the PDF. This can be used to override

When using HtmlHeaderFooter it is important to set HtmlFragment

Merge meta-data into your HTML using any of these placeholder strings: {page} {total-pages} {url} {date} {time} {html-title} {pdf-title}

Inheritance
System.Object
TextHeaderFooter
HtmlHeaderFooter
Implements
System.ICloneable
Inherited Members
Namespace: IronPdf
Assembly: IronPdf.dll
Syntax
public class HtmlHeaderFooter : TextHeaderFooter, ITextHeaderFooter

Full HTML rendering in PDF headers and footers becomes available through HtmlHeaderFooter. Assign any HTML snippet to HtmlFragment and IronPDF stamps it across every page of the output document, giving you pixel-accurate control over fonts, images, tables, and brand colours that plain-text headers cannot achieve. The class extends TextHeaderFooter, so it slots directly into the same HtmlToPdf and PdfDocument rendering pipeline.

HtmlFragment is the central property. Set it to a self-contained HTML string and use the built-in placeholder tokens to inject live values at render time: {page} for the current page number, {total-pages} for the document length, {date} and {time} for the render timestamp, {url} for the source URL, {html-title} for the page title, and {pdf-title} for the PDF document title. These tokens are resolved per-page, so a footer reading "Page {page} of {total-pages}" always reflects the correct values without any extra code.

When the header or footer references external stylesheets, web fonts, or images hosted relative to the source document, set BaseUrl to the root URL or local directory path so that the renderer can resolve those resources correctly. If the main HTML document already loads a stylesheet you want to reuse in the header, set LoadStylesAndCSSFromMainHtmlDocument to true and IronPDF will carry those styles across automatically, keeping the visual language consistent without duplicating CSS.

MaxHeight accepts a nullable integer (in millimetres) that caps how tall the header or footer region can grow. Leave it null to let the content determine the height. The constant FragmentHeight exposes the internal sentinel value used when no explicit cap is set. Clone() produces a deep copy of the configured object, which is useful when you need slightly different headers for different rendering passes without rebuilding from scratch.

using IronPdf;

var renderer = new ChromePdfRenderer();
renderer.RenderingOptions.HtmlFooter = new HtmlHeaderFooter
{
    MaxHeight = 15,
    HtmlFragment = "<div style='font-family:Arial;font-size:10px;text-align:right'>" +
                   "Page {page} of {total-pages} &nbsp;|&nbsp; {date}</div>",
    LoadStylesAndCSSFromMainHtmlDocument = false
};

using PdfDocument pdf = renderer.RenderHtmlAsPdf("<h1>Annual Report</h1><p>Content here.</p>");
pdf.SaveAs("report.pdf");

For a broader introduction to PDF generation, visit the IronPDF documentation hub. Step-by-step guidance on stamping headers and footers is covered in the HTML header and footer how-to, and runnable snippets are available on the header and footer examples page. Licensing and trial options are on the get-started page.

Constructors

HtmlHeaderFooter()

Declaration
public HtmlHeaderFooter()

Fields

FragmentHeight

When MaxHeight is set to this values, the renderer will make sure that the margins of the page are adjusted to fit the HTML fragment.

Declaration
public const int FragmentHeight = 2147483647
Field Value
Type Description
System.Int32

Properties

BaseUrl

The Base URL all URLS in the HtmlFragment will be relative to. This includes 'src' attributes on images, scripts, style-sheets and also hrefs on hyper-links.

Note: A base URL that points to a directory should end with a slash.

Base URL accepts file paths as well as URLS. If no BaseUrl is given, the HtmlHeaderFooter BaseUrl will be inherited from the main HTML document where possible.

Declaration
public string BaseUrl { get; set; }
Property Value
Type Description
System.String

HtmlFragment

The HTML which will be used to render the Header or Footer should be an HTML snippet rather than a complete document. It may contain styles & images.

Merge meta-data into the HtmlFragment by putting any of these placeholder strings into the text: {page} {total-pages} {url} {date} {time} {html-title} {pdf-title}. An alternative mail-merge style using the pattern <span class='total-pages'></span> is also supported.

HtmlFragment is a stand-alone HTML document which does not inherit styles or settings from your main HTML content unless LoadStylesAndCSSFromMainHtmlDocument is set true

Declaration
public string HtmlFragment { get; set; }
Property Value
Type Description
System.String

LoadStylesAndCSSFromMainHtmlDocument

Loads style code blocks and links to CSS style sheets from the main HTML document (which provides the PDF content) into the HtmlHeaderFooter .

By default, HTML Headers and Footers are stand- alone HTML documents with their own default styles. Setting LoadStylesAndCSSFromMainHtmlDocument to true will attempt to load all STYLE and LINK tags from the main HTML document (which renders teh PDF) into the HtmlHeaderFooter.

If your main HTML document contains complex CSS frameworks, styles the HEAD or BODY element heavily or loads CSS from javascript then this method may not work as intended.

This feature is not available for RenderUrlAsPdf methods. It works for RenderHtmlAsPdf, HTMLToPdf and HtmlFileToPdf conversions only.

It is often preferable to load style sheets explicitly into your HTML Headers and Footers as STYLE and LINK tags within the HtmlFragment for granular control

Not supported in Docker mode.

Declaration
public bool LoadStylesAndCSSFromMainHtmlDocument { get; set; }
Property Value
Type Description
System.Boolean

MaxHeight

Maximum Height of the HTML Header / Footer in millimeters. This value must be set sufficiently high to display the full HTML header / footer content.

Declaration
public Nullable<int> MaxHeight { get; set; }
Property Value
Type Description
System.Nullable<System.Int32>

Methods

Clone()

Supports System.ICloneable. Creates a deep copy of this class instance.

Declaration
public object Clone()
Returns
Type Description
System.Object

A deep clone of this instance. Use explicit casting to convert object back to the intended type.

Implements

System.ICloneable

Inherited members

CenterText
DrawDividerLine
DrawDividerLineColor
Font
FontSize
LeftText
RightText