Issuing 5,000 course certificates in one afternoon

A spreadsheet of names, one landscape template, batch requests of 100, and signed links per student. The full workflow including naming, verification codes and delivery.

Updated 31 August 2026

Training platforms hit this once a cohort: hundreds or thousands of certificates, each with a name, a course, a date and a unique code, due by Friday.

Data first

One row per certificate: recipient, course, completion date, a verification code you generate (random, not sequential — sequential codes let anyone enumerate other students' certificates), and an email.

The template

A landscape A4 with the recipient's name as the largest element, the issuer, the course, the date, a signatory and the code. PDFGeny's `certificate` template is exactly that; or send your own HTML with your branding.

Batching

Send batches of 100:

POST /api/v1/batch
{"documents":[{"template":"certificate","data":{"recipient":"Ada Lovelace","course":"…","cert_id":"NA-7K2M"},"filename":"NA-7K2M.pdf"}, … ]}

Fifty batches for 5,000 certificates; each job returns a signed link when done. Poll the batch or receive a webhook per document.

Verification page

Publish `/verify/` on your site that shows the certificate's holder and course. The code on the PDF becomes proof, and employers check it without emailing you.

Delivery

Email each student their signed link (valid seven days) and keep a copy in your storage for re-issue. Attachments of 5,000 emails will trip spam filters; links will not.

Try it: convert HTML to PDF in the browser, or get a free API key — 50 documents a month.

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