freeai-convert

Universal file format converter. One dispatch table, ~80 format pairs across image / audio / video / pdf / office / ebook / csv / srt / archive / 3d.

pip install freeai-convert
freeconvert resume.pdf resume.docx
freeconvert song.flac song.mp3
freeconvert photo.heic photo.jpg
freeconvert deck.pptx deck.pdf

Same converter that backs every /convert/<pair>/ page on free.ai, extracted into a standalone CLI + Python library.

Why this exists

Most "universal converters" are either thin wrappers around pandoc (great for text, useless for images) or trillion-dependency monsters that take a pip install over a coffee break. freeai-convert is a dispatch table: one (src_ext, dst_ext) → handler map. Each handler is a 5–30 line wrapper around the right tool for the job — Pillow for images, ffmpeg for media, libreoffice for office, pdf2docx / pdfplumber for PDF, calibre for e-books, trimesh for 3D meshes, stdlib for csv/json/srt/vtt.

Adding a new format pair = one function + one line in HANDLERS. No abstraction, no plugin system, no class hierarchy.

What's supported

Run freeconvert --list to see the full set. Highlights:

From	To	Tool
jpg/png/webp/heic/bmp/tiff/ico/gif	any image format	Pillow (+ pillow-heif for HEIC)
any image	pdf	Pillow
svg	png/jpg	cairosvg
mp3/wav/flac/m4a/aac/ogg/opus/wma	any audio	ffmpeg
mp4/webm/mov/avi/mkv/flv	any video	ffmpeg
any video	any audio	ffmpeg (strip + re-encode)
any video	gif	ffmpeg (palette-gen, 2-pass)
pdf	docx / xlsx / pptx / txt / png / jpg	pdf2docx / pdfplumber / pdf2image
docx/xlsx/pptx/odt/ods/rtf/html	pdf	libreoffice --headless
docx ↔ odt / rtf / html / txt, xlsx ↔ ods, pptx ↔ odp		libreoffice
md → html / pdf / docx		stdlib regex / libreoffice
txt → pdf / docx		reportlab / python-docx
csv ↔ json, xlsx ↔ csv / json, csv ↔ xlsx		stdlib + openpyxl
srt ↔ vtt, srt → txt		stdlib
epub/mobi/azw3/fb2/lit ↔ each other ↔ pdf/docx/html/md/txt/rtf		calibre + pandoc
zip ↔ tar/tar.gz/7z		stdlib + py7zr
obj ↔ stl ↔ ply ↔ glb ↔ gltf		trimesh

Install

# Minimal install — CLI + dispatch table + stdlib-only handlers (csv/json/srt/vtt):
pip install freeai-convert

# Plus pure-Python image/PDF/office support:
pip install 'freeai-convert[image,pdf,office]'

# Everything pip-installable:
pip install 'freeai-convert[all]'

Several handlers shell out to system tools — install them via your OS package manager:

Handler	System dep	Debian/Ubuntu	macOS (brew)
audio / video / gif	ffmpeg	apt install ffmpeg	brew install ffmpeg
pdf → pptx, pdf → png/jpg	poppler-utils	apt install poppler-utils	brew install poppler
office ↔ office, office → pdf	libreoffice	apt install libreoffice	brew install --cask libreoffice
ebook (mobi/azw3/fb2/lit)	calibre	apt install calibre	brew install --cask calibre
ebook (epub fast-path)	pandoc	apt install pandoc	brew install pandoc

If you call a handler whose system tool is missing, you'll get a clear RuntimeError naming what failed.

Python API

from freeconvert import convert, lookup, supported_pairs, UnsupportedConversionError

# Easiest — formats inferred from extensions:
info = convert("/tmp/in.pdf", "/tmp/out.docx")
# {'src': 'pdf', 'dst': 'docx', 'category': 'pdf_to_word', 'cost': 1000}

# Explicit src/dst when extensions are wrong or missing:
convert("/tmp/blob", "/tmp/out.png", src="jpg", dst="png")

# Probe before running:
resolved = lookup("heic", "jpg")
if resolved is None:
    raise UnsupportedConversionError(...)
handler, category, cost, src, dst = resolved

# Or inspect the dispatch table directly:
("pdf", "docx") in supported_pairs()  # True

The cost field is an arbitrary relative-compute estimate (200 = light Pillow work, 1500 = libreoffice reflow). Useful for queue backpressure on a server; safe to ignore in scripts.

Extending it

from freeconvert.handlers import HANDLERS

def _yaml_to_json(in_path, out_path, src, dst):
    import yaml, json
    with open(in_path) as f: data = yaml.safe_load(f)
    with open(out_path, "w") as f: json.dump(data, f, indent=2)

HANDLERS[("yaml", "json")] = (_yaml_to_json, "data")

That's it — your new pair is now reachable via convert() and the CLI.

Don't want to install anything? Use the hosted API

Same code, behind an HTTPS endpoint at api.free.ai. No signup required for the daily free pool (~10K tokens, enough for ~50 image conversions or ~10 PDF→Word).

# Convert PDF → DOCX:
curl -X POST https://api.free.ai/v1/convert/ \
  -F "file=@resume.pdf" \
  -F "to_format=docx" \
  -o resp.json

# resp.json:
# {
#   "job_id": "…",
#   "file_url": "https://api.free.ai/static/outputs/<id>.docx",
#   "from": "pdf", "to": "docx",
#   "category": "pdf_to_word", "tokens": 1000
# }

# List every supported pair (no auth required):
curl https://api.free.ai/v1/convert/list/

# Python:
import httpx
with open("photo.heic", "rb") as f:
    r = httpx.post(
        "https://api.free.ai/v1/convert/",
        files={"file": f},
        data={"to_format": "jpg"},
        timeout=60,
    )
print(r.json()["file_url"])

For higher limits, sign up at free.ai and pass X-User-Id: <your-id> (or use the OpenAI-compatible Bearer-token API key from /account/?tab=api). Token cost is the same cost field returned by freeconvert.lookup() — 200 for an image swap, 1000 for PDF→Word, 1500 for libreoffice reflow.

Project layout

freeconvert/
├── __init__.py     # convert(), exports
├── handlers.py     # HANDLERS dispatch table + handler functions
├── cli.py          # click CLI
└── __main__.py     # python -m freeconvert

License

MIT — see LICENSE.

Related

• free-scene — multi-scene AI movie maker
• free-code — agentic coding CLI
• free-sdk — Python SDK for the Free.ai API
• free.ai — 400+ AI tools, the home of this codebase