Export an AI response to PDF

One response, not the conversation

Every settled assistant response carries a Save as PDF action beside its copy action. It exports that response. It does not export the thread, and we would rather say so plainly than let you discover it at the wrong moment.

If you want the whole conversation, use Markdown export from the history flyout, described in local conversation history. The two features exist for different jobs.

Stopped or partial responses can be exported too, and are marked stopped before completion in the document meta line so a truncated answer is never mistaken for a complete one. Empty assistant messages do not offer the action.

What the document looks like

The output is A4 with restrained chrome: a header carrying SideNote Pro and the visible provider and model, a centred page number, and an optional document title with the local date. Body typography is sized for reading on paper rather than transplanted from the screen.

• Headings, paragraphs, bold, italic, inline code, ordered and unordered lists and block quotes are all preserved.
• Tables repeat their headers on every page they continue onto, wrap cell text, and shrink from 9 pt to 7 pt before columns are redistributed, so a wide table is never clipped off the edge.
• Code blocks use a monospaced face on a tinted panel and wrap rather than running past the margin.
• Sources from folder retrieval are appended under their own heading, using the same provenance labels shown in the conversation. Excerpt bodies are never included. Responses without sources omit the section.
• Long responses paginate naturally.

Text is drawn as real text, never as a screenshot, so the result is selectable, copyable and searchable in any PDF reader.

File naming

The default file name is taken from the conversation title, then the response's first heading, then the start of the response, falling back to SideNote Pro response. Characters Windows rejects are removed, reserved device names are avoided, and the name is truncated at a word boundary. You can change it in the native save dialog. Cancelling the dialog does nothing at all, and a write failure reports a short actionable message rather than exception text.

Export is entirely local

Rendering happens from the response already sitting on your PC. No provider request, no licensing request, no telemetry, no upload. Nothing is added to usage or cost accounting, and no file is written anywhere except the destination you chose.

Nothing sensitive rides along in the document either. Token counts, cost estimates, provider profile identifiers, usage ledger data, system framing and licensing state are never written to the PDF.

There is no browser engine, Chromium instance, WebView print pipeline, Office automation or external executable behind this. The PDF is written by the same library the application already uses to read attached PDFs.

A real limitation worth knowing

PDF export covers Latin script. SideNote Pro embeds a subset of the Windows Arial faces, with Consolas for code, and rejects any face whose OpenType fsType forbids document embedding or subsetting. If no usable system face is found, it falls back to the Standard-14 fonts every PDF reader ships.

When people reach for it

• Attaching a technical explanation to a ticket for people who will not see the conversation.
• Filing the analysis behind a decision, so the reasoning survives the decision.
• Handing a structured recommendation to a client or a stakeholder.
• Archiving a research answer outside the conversation archive, where retention will not eventually prune it.
• Producing something readable on paper or on a tablet, away from the machine.

The walkthrough is at exporting an AI response to PDF.