---
id: datalab-python-sdk
version: "0.5.0"
license: MIT
license_treatment: permissive
maintenance: active
---

# datalab-python-sdk — SDK for the Datalab document intelligence API

License: permissive · Maintenance: active · Downloads: 94.5K/mo

## What it is and what it does

Datalab SDK is a Python client library for the Datalab document intelligence platform. It provides both a programmatic API and CLI for converting documents to markdown and orchestrating multi-step document processing workflows. The package wraps HTTP calls to a remote Datalab service, handling authentication via API key and managing request/response serialization through pydantic, with built-in retry logic via tenacity and progress reporting via tqdm.

Typical use is to authenticate once with an API key, then call convert() on a document path to retrieve structured output including markdown representation. The SDK also supports chaining multiple processing steps into reusable workflows for more complex document intelligence tasks.

Use it for:

- Convert PDF documents to markdown for downstream processing or storage in knowledge bases.
- Extract text and structure from scanned or complex-layout documents using document intelligence.
- Chain multiple document processing steps into reusable workflows for batch automation.
- Automate document conversion in data pipelines or ETL workflows.
- Build document ingestion layers for applications requiring clean markdown from unstructured documents.

## Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts above — verify before relying.

A Python SDK for calling the Datalab API to convert documents to markdown and execute multi-step document processing workflows.

Yes, if you need to convert documents to markdown or run document processing workflows and have access to a Datalab API key. The package is actively maintained, has low install friction, carries a permissive MIT license, and integrates well with Python data pipelines. No known vulnerabilities. Main consideration is dependency on an external API service and availability of Datalab credentials.

## Install

pip install datalab-python-sdk
uv add datalab-python-sdk
poetry add datalab-python-sdk

## Installing datalab-python-sdk

Before you install: Low install friction with a pure-Python wheel and seven runtime dependencies. Actively maintained with recent release; requires Python 3.10 or later.

License in practice: MIT license permits free use, modification, and distribution with minimal restrictions, suitable for both open-source and commercial projects.

Quickstart:

pip install datalab-python-sdk

import os
os.environ['DATALAB_API_KEY'] = 'your_api_key_here'

from datalab_python_sdk import DatalabClient
client = DatalabClient()
result = client.convert('document.pdf')
print(result.markdown)

Requires DATALAB_API_KEY environment variable or api_key parameter; requires Python 3.10 or later.

Verify before relying:

- Whether marker and surya are bundled dependencies or require separate installation.
- Performance characteristics for large documents or batch processing workflows.
- Rate limits or SLA guarantees of the underlying Datalab API service.

## Package facts

- License: MIT (permissive)
- Python support: supports_current
- Install friction: low
- Maintenance: active
- Downloads: 94.5K/month (top 15,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

pdf to markdown conversion, document intelligence api client, datalab sdk python, document processing workflows, document extraction api, api client for document conversion, markdown extraction from pdf, document-processing, api-client, pdf-extraction

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