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mdyab0001
Known Participant
September 15, 2026
Question

Convert Large Doc to base64

  • September 15, 2026
  • 8 replies
  • 72 views

Hello,

 

I would like to inquire about the best practice for converting a large PDF document to base64 (approximately 500 MB). Currently, when using the base64todoc node in the process model, the conversion takes a considerable amount of time to complete.

Could you please advise on the most efficient approach to perform this conversion and achieve the shortest possible processing time?

 

Thanks,

8 replies

mikes0011
mikes0011
Brainy
September 15, 2026

Can you expand upon your use case for doing this?  A 500MB binary document converted to Base64 is going to be an incredibly heavy amount of text no matter what you do (hence the node processing burden you already describe), and i’m unclear whether any single solution is going to really make this any less burdensome.

What requirement are you doing this to accomplish?  Is there any flexibility in your design that would allow you to consider other approaches for handling the document in question, for instance?

The Expression Guru
    mdyab0001Author
    Known Participant
    September 17, 2026

    Thanks for your reply ​@mikes0011 

     

    At my organization, we use an archiving system to store all our files. Recently, however, we encountered an issue where large files were not being archived correctly. We began looking for a solution by building a new API designed to receive the file in Base64 format and archive it in the designated location.

     

    However, upon integrating this API, we noticed system sluggishness caused by converting the file to Base64 before transmission. I am therefore looking for assistance regarding any alternative methods I might utilize.

     

    mathieud0001
    mathieud0001
    Brainy
    September 17, 2026

    Converting 500mb to base64 will always be slow. No way around that. I would explore perhaps different options for sending the file over

    1. Chunked uploads
    2. Pre-signed URLs
    3. Streaming
      harshas2775
      harshas2775
      Brainy
      September 17, 2026

      Can you try to compress the said pdf file and see if after conversion archival works as expected. Alternatively you can also split the large pdf into smaller pdfs before archival. Both functionalities are available with PDF Tools plugin. 

      Happy to help. Even happier to optimize.
        mdyab0001Author
        Known Participant
        September 20, 2026

        Thanks for your reply ​@harshas2775 

         

        The compression option was tested; however, compressing a 250 MB file took approximately 5 minutes and reduced the file size to only 150 MB in addition to reducing the file resolution. As a result, the process introduced additional delays without achieving a significant size reduction, ultimately having a negative impact on overall performance.

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