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pst2pdf

Converts a PST file to one PDF per email, as well as a combined PDF if desired. Built for e-discovery workflows — supports sequential Bates stamping burned directly onto each page and an optional manifest CSV index.

Download

Pre-built standalone binaries are available on the Releases page

Platform	GUI	CLI
Windows	pst2pdf-gui.exe	pst2pdf.exe
Linux	pst2pdf-gui	pst2pdf

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GUI

Double-click pst2pdf-gui (or pst2pdf-gui.exe on Windows) to launch the graphical interface.

(Note: On Windows, you will get a prompt about unrecognized developer. This is expected at this time.)

1. Click Browse next to PST File and select your .pst file
2. The Output Dir is pre-filled to an output/ folder next to the PST, feel free to change it if needed
3. Adjust options as required (hover any label for a tooltip explanation)
4. Click Convert and progress and log output appear at the bottom

The GUI provides:

• File pickers for the PST file and output directory
• Filename Prefix — text prepended to every output filename (e.g. MSG → MSG_00001.pdf)
• Attachments — embed inside PDF / extract as separate files / ignore
• Manifest CSV toggle and merge-to-single-PDF toggle
• Advanced panel (collapsible) — start number, max attachment size, Bates stamping, deduplication, non-email items

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CLI

There is also a standalone CLI utility if you prefer to use that over the graphical utility.

# Basic conversion
pst2pdf evidence.pst ./output/

# With Bates stamping burned onto every page + manifest index, prefix each file with SMITH
pst2pdf evidence.pst ./output/ --bates --prefix SMITH --manifest

# Continue a prior production starting at item 500, prefix each file with SMITH
pst2pdf evidence2.pst ./output/ --bates --prefix SMITH --start-num 500 --manifest

# Extract attachments as separate files alongside PDFs
pst2pdf evidence.pst ./output/ --attachments extract

# Email bodies only, no attachments, merge everything into one PDF
pst2pdf evidence.pst ./output/ --attachments none --merge all.pdf

On Windows the binary is pst2pdf.exe; on Linux you may need to mark it executable first:

chmod +x pst2pdf
./pst2pdf evidence.pst ./output/

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Running from source

If you prefer to run the Python scripts directly (e.g. for development):

Requirements

• Python 3.10+
• libpff native library
  • Ubuntu/Debian: sudo apt install libpff-dev
  • Windows: installed automatically via the libpff-python wheel
• Python packages: pip install -r pst2pdf/requirements.txt

cd pst2pdf

# GUI
python gui.py

# CLI
python pst2pdf.py evidence.pst ./output/ --bates --prefix SMITH --manifest

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Options

Flag	Default	Description
--prefix PREFIX	MSG	Filename prefix and Bates label prefix
--start-num N	1	Starting number for filenames and Bates page counter
--bates	off	Burn Bates numbers onto each page
--bates-pad N	6	Zero-pad width for Bates numbers (6 → 000001)
--manifest	off	Write manifest.csv index to the output directory
--no-dedup	off	Disable deduplication — by default emails with the same Message-ID are only output once
--include-non-email	off	Include calendar events, contacts, and other non-email items (excluded by default)
--attachments MODE	embed	How to handle attachments: embed — render as extra pages in the PDF; extract — save original files alongside PDFs named MSG_00001_01_filename.ext; none — ignore attachments entirely
--max-attachment-size MB	10	Skip embedding attachments larger than this size in MB (embed mode only). Use 0 to disable the limit.
--merge FILENAME	off	After converting, merge all PDFs into one file in the output directory (e.g. --merge all.pdf)
--verbose	off	Enable debug logging

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Output

• SMITH_00001.pdf, SMITH_00002.pdf, ... — one PDF per email, sequentially named
• Each PDF contains a shaded header block (From, To, CC, Date, Subject, Message-ID, PST folder path, attachments) followed by the email body
• Attachment handling depends on --attachments mode:
  • embed (default) — attachments become extra pages in the PDF:
    • Images (jpg, png, gif, bmp, tiff) — scaled to fit and rendered inline
    • Plain text (txt, csv, log, etc.) — rendered as monospaced text pages
    • PDFs — pages appended directly after the email body
    • Other formats (docx, xlsx, etc.) — a notice page is added with the filename
    • Oversized attachments — skipped with a notice page; use --max-attachment-size to adjust the threshold
  • extract — attachments saved as separate files: MSG_00001_01_contract.docx, MSG_00001_02_photo.jpg, etc.
  • none — attachments ignored; PDFs contain headers and body only
• When --bates is on, every page (including embedded attachment pages) has a stamped label (e.g. SMITH_000042) in the bottom-right corner
• --merge all.pdf produces a single PDF of the entire PST alongside the individual files
• manifest.csv (optional) — one row per email with columns: filename, date, from, to, cc, subject, message_id, folder_path, attachments, and (if --bates) bates_begin, bates_end

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Build standalone binaries

# Linux/Mac
./pst2pdf/build.sh        # → pst2pdf/dist/pst2pdf      (CLI)
                          # → pst2pdf/dist/pst2pdf-gui  (GUI)

# Windows
pst2pdf\build.bat         # → pst2pdf\dist\pst2pdf.exe      (CLI)
                          # → pst2pdf\dist\pst2pdf-gui.exe  (GUI)

Requires PyInstaller (pip install pyinstaller). Both binaries bundle all dependencies and run without a Python installation. The GUI binary uses --windowed so no console window appears on Windows.

Test data shamelessly ( 😬 ) stolen from:

• https://github.com/aspose-email/Aspose.Email-Python-Dotnet/tree/c564549cfb3b3b1e3d1275dbc1fd01aa5696df35/Examples/Data