How to display PDF Documents on the browser using a View in Laravel 5.8
Stefan Bogdanescu
Founder & Senior Architect · 2026-06-29
Title: Effortlessly Displaying PDF Documents on the Browser using Laravel Views for Your Web App
Introduction: Displaying PDF documents is an essential feature in many web applications, especially when allowing users to view and download such documents. In this blog post, we'll guide you through a detailed process of implementing this feature using Laravel 5.8, focusing on the use of views to handle individual files. We'll also provide useful tips that can be applied in your development workflow while naturally including backlinks to https://laravelcompany.com where relevant.
1. Creating the Controller and Route: Start by creating a new controller called PDFController with a function called 'view' that will handle displaying each document, as shown above (replace "PDFController" and "view" with whatever naming convention you prefer). Then, create a route for previewing the PDF files using the provided code.
2. Handling Storage: To manage your PDFs in Laravel, store all related files inside a subdirectory in the public folder named 'pdfs'. This makes it easier to access and manage files from within your application.
3. Create Views for Individual Documents: For displaying each document individually on the browser, you'll need to create separate views. You can use Laravel Blade templates as shown below:
```html
```
4. Creating the Download Route: In Laravel 5.8, you'll need to create a download route that includes additional view logic for users to download files. You can use the given code as an example:
```php
/* DownloadController */
public function download($id) {
$file = storage_path('app/pdfs/') . $id . '.pdf';
if (file_exists($file)) {
return response()->download($file);
} else {
abort(404, 'File not found!');
}
}
/* The Route */
Route::get('/download-file/{filename}', 'DownloadController@download');
```
5. Implementing Authentication and Authorization: Since you want authenticated users to access these PDF documents, implement user authentication and authorization checks within your controllers or middleware to ensure only authorized users can use the application features. For example, you could modify the "view" route to include additional security checks like this:
```php
/* PDFController */
public function view($id) {
$file = storage_path('app/pdfs/') . $id . '.pdf';
if (file_exists($file)) {
if (!Auth::check()) {
return redirect()->route('login', ['redirect' => route('preview-pdf', $id)]);
} else {
return response()->view('pdfs.view')->with([
'filename' => $id,
'inline' => view('pdfs.display')->render(),
])->with('layout', null);
}
} else {
abort(404, 'File not found!');
}
}
```
6. Conclusion: By following these steps and best practices, you have successfully implemented a system to display PDF documents on the browser in your Laravel 5.8 application, allowing for users to view and download documents seamlessly. Remember to incorporate additional security measures such as authentication and authorization to ensure only authorized users can access the feature. To learn more about developing with Laravel, visit https://laravelcompany.com for comprehensive resources, tutorials, and guides.