Exporting Documents

Take your pages with you as a PDF, images, an animated GIF or a portable file, or drop a live view into another site.

Your documents are not locked inside livedocuments. When you want a copy to print, attach, or drop into a chat, you can export a tab's pages as a PDF, as images or as an animated GIF, or keep the tab as a file you can import back. And when you want the document to stay live wherever you put it, you can embed it instead.

Exporting a tab

Export works on one tab at a time, so switch to the tab you want first. Then either:

  • open the tab's ⋯ menu and choose Export; or
  • open the Explorer panel's menu and choose Export, which exports the tab you are on.
The Export dialog: All pages or One page, the page the preview shows, and what the download will be.

Pick a format, then All pages or One page:

  • PDF to print or attach: every page in one PDF, in order, each at its own size, so an A4 page comes out a true A4 page. Or just the page you pick.
  • PNG or SVG for a picture: PNG to paste into docs and chat, SVG to stay sharp at any size. One page gives you that page's image; all pages give you a .zip with one image per page.
  • GIF for an animated image that plays anywhere a picture does, with everything that moves on a page moving in it.
  • JSON for a .livedocuments-tab.json file that imports back into livedocuments with everything intact. This is the one to keep as a backup.

Each page exports exactly its sheet: its size, its background and what is on it, cut off at its edges just as the editor shows it. Exporting and Presenting Pages covers every format and option in detail.

An export is the right choice when you need a fixed snapshot: a handout, a report, an attachment, or a printout.

Embedding a live view

When you want the document to keep updating wherever it lives, embed it instead. An embed is an iframe of a shared document that you can drop into Notion, a wiki, or any page that accepts an iframe.

An embed follows the role of the pass it was made from: a Viewer or Participant pass embeds a read-only view, an Editor pass an editable one. It hides the editor's controls, leaving your pages with pan and zoom, and it stays live: as the document is edited, the embed updates in place rather than showing a stale snapshot.

To grab one, open the Share dialog, find the pass you want, open its Embed menu and choose Copy iframe for a ready-made snippet you can paste straight into your page, or Copy embed URL for the address alone. A document in This Browser has no passes, so sync it first.

Reach for an image when you need a fixed snapshot, and an embed when you want the document to keep updating in place wherever you have put it. For a picture that updates itself, see Live Image.

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