Quick start

This page takes you from no account to a saved screenshot in about a minute. You create a key, send one request, and check the response headers. It is the first step in the RenderScreenshot documentation.

Step by step: Take your first screenshot walks through this task with screenshots of every step.

1. Get an API key

Create a free account and verify your email address. A new account gets 10 trial credits, so you can make your first screenshot at once. The full free allowance unlocks after verification. The free plan renews its credits every month and needs no credit card. The current allowance for each plan is on the pricing page. One successful screenshot uses one credit. Failed requests use none.

Open API Keys in the dashboard and create a key. It is shown once, so copy it now. A live key is rs_live_ followed by 32 letters and digits. Keep it in an environment variable, not in your code:

export RS_API_KEY=rs_live_your_key_here

API keys explains the other key types, rotation and storage.

2. Take your first screenshot

The request below renders https://example.com at the og_card preset (1200×630 PNG) and saves it. To send it from a GUI instead, import the Postman collection. -D - prints the response headers, which step 3 explains.

curl -X POST https://api.renderscreenshot.com/v1/screenshot \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $RS_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"url": "https://example.com", "preset": "og_card"}' \
  -D - --output screenshot.png

Or use an official SDK. Each tab starts with its install command.

Node.js

// npm install renderscreenshot
import { Client, TakeOptions } from 'renderscreenshot';
import { writeFile } from 'node:fs/promises';

const client = new Client(process.env.RS_API_KEY);

const image = await client.take(
  TakeOptions.url('https://example.com').preset('og_card')
);
await writeFile('screenshot.png', image);

Python

# pip install renderscreenshot
import os

from renderscreenshot import Client, TakeOptions

client = Client(os.environ['RS_API_KEY'])

image = client.take(TakeOptions.url('https://example.com').preset('og_card'))

with open('screenshot.png', 'wb') as f:
    f.write(image)

Ruby

# gem install renderscreenshot
require 'renderscreenshot'

client = RenderScreenshot.client(ENV.fetch('RS_API_KEY'))

image = client.take(
  RenderScreenshot::TakeOptions.url('https://example.com').preset('og_card')
)

File.binwrite('screenshot.png', image)

PHP

<?php
// composer require renderscreenshot/renderscreenshot
require 'vendor/autoload.php';

use RenderScreenshot\Client;
use RenderScreenshot\TakeOptions;

$client = new Client(getenv('RS_API_KEY'));

$image = $client->take(
    TakeOptions::url('https://example.com')->preset('og_card')
);

file_put_contents('screenshot.png', $image);

Go

// go get github.com/Render-Screenshot/rs-go
package main

import (
    "context"
    "log"
    "os"

    rs "github.com/Render-Screenshot/rs-go"
)

func main() {
    client, err := rs.New(os.Getenv("RS_API_KEY"))
    if err != nil {
        log.Fatal(err)
    }

    image, err := client.Take(context.Background(),
        rs.URL("https://example.com").Preset("og_card"),
    )
    if err != nil {
        log.Fatal(err)
    }

    if err := os.WriteFile("screenshot.png", image, 0o644); err != nil {
        log.Fatal(err)
    }
}

Java

// Add com.github.Render-Screenshot:rs-java from JitPack (see the Java SDK page)
import com.renderscreenshot.sdk.Client;
import com.renderscreenshot.sdk.TakeOptions;
import java.nio.file.Files;
import java.nio.file.Path;

public class QuickStart {
    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
        Client client = new Client(System.getenv("RS_API_KEY"));

        byte[] image = client.take(
            TakeOptions.url("https://example.com").preset("og_card")
        );

        Files.write(Path.of("screenshot.png"), image);
    }
}

CLI

# brew install render-screenshot/tap/rs   (reads RS_API_KEY)
rs take https://example.com --preset og_card -o screenshot.png

Tested on 2026-10-15: the curl, Node, Python, Ruby, PHP and Go listings ran against a local stub of the API and each sent the same {"url", "preset"} request. The Java listing follows the Java SDK reference and was not run.

3. Read the response

A success is HTTP 200 with the image as the body. The headers tell you what happened:

To get JSON with the CDN URL instead of the image bytes, send Accept: application/json. See response formats.

If the first request fails

curl still writes the body to screenshot.png, so a failed request leaves a small JSON file there. A missing or mistyped key gives HTTP 401:

{
  "error": {
    "type": "authentication_error",
    "code": "missing_credentials",
    "message": "No valid API key or signature provided",
    "retryable": false,
    "docs": "https://renderscreenshot.com/docs/errors/missing-credentials"
  },
  "request_id": "b1c2d3e4-0000-4000-8000-000000000001"
}

In an SDK, catch the error class and log the status, code and request ID. The Ruby version, tested against the same stub:

require 'renderscreenshot'

client = RenderScreenshot.client(ENV.fetch('RS_API_KEY'))

begin
  image = client.take(RenderScreenshot::TakeOptions.url('https://example.com').preset('og_card'))
  File.binwrite('screenshot.png', image)
rescue RenderScreenshot::Error => e
  warn "HTTP #{e.http_status} #{e.code}: #{e.message} (request #{e.request_id})"
  exit 1
end

The error codes page has retry code for Node, Python and Ruby.

4. Pick a preset

A preset sets the viewport and format in one parameter. Any parameter you send yourself overrides the preset value.

The presets reference lists all of them, including pdf_document, mobile_landscape and desktop_4k.

5. Show the image on a web page

Do not put an rs_live_ key in HTML. Anyone who views the source can copy it and spend your credits. Use one of these instead:

• Render once, link the CDN copy. Take the screenshot on your server and use the X-Cache-URL from the response. See caching.
• Sign the URL. Build a signed URL on your server. It can go straight into an og:image tag and stops working after its expiry.

Next steps

• POST /v1/screenshot: every option in one request body
• GET /v1/screenshot: the same capture as a URL
• All parameters: viewport, wait, blocking, PDF and more
• SDKs and the CLI