I built a PDF + Image + Invoice API platform — free tier, no card required

What I built

Forgelab is a developer API platform that handles the boring document and image work so you can ship faster.

Right now it does four things:

• PDF API — merge, split, compress, convert
• Image API — resize, compress, convert, watermark
• Invoice API — generate professional PDF invoices from JSON
• QR Code API — generate and decode QR codes

The problem it solves

Every SaaS app eventually needs to generate invoices, resize images, or process PDFs. You either spend a week building it yourself, or you pay $99/month for a service that does one thing.

Forgelab bundles all of it under one API key.

How it works

# Generate an invoice in one API call
curl -X POST https://api.forgelab.africa/api/invoice/generate \
  -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "client": { "name": "Acme Corp", "email": "[email protected]" },
    "items": [{ "description": "Web development", "quantity": 10, "unit_price": 150 }],
    "currency": "USD",
    "template": "modern"
  }' \
  --output invoice.pdf

Pricing

• Free: 5 calls/month, no card
• Starter: $5/month — 100 calls
• Pro: $15/month — 1,000 calls
• Business: $30/month — 10,000 calls

One subscription works across all APIs.

Try it

https://forgelab.africa

I built this to scratch my own itch. Would love feedback from anyone who has dealt with invoice generation or PDF handling in their apps.