--- title: Anthropic Messages Images and PDFs with AI Gateway product: vercel url: /docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api/images canonical_url: "https://vercel.com/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api/images" last_updated: 2026-09-08 type: reference prerequisites: - /docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api - /docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis related: [] summary: Send images and PDF documents as part of your Anthropic API message requests through AI Gateway. install_vercel_plugin: npx plugins add vercel/vercel-plugin --- # Anthropic Messages Images and PDFs with AI Gateway Send images and PDF documents as part of your message request. ## Related pages > **For AI agents:** Follow these links to understand how this page connects to the rest of the Vercel ecosystem. For the full cross-link map (inbound, outbound, prerequisites, and semantic neighbors), see the .graph.md link below. - [Anthropic Messages Requests with AI Gateway](https://vercel.com/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api/messages?from=related&source_path=%2Fdocs%2Fai-gateway%2Fsdks-and-apis%2Fanthropic-messages-api%2Fimages&source_site=vercel-docs&relationship=related) — Create messages using the Anthropic Messages API format with support for streaming through AI Gateway. - [Anthropic Messages Streaming with AI Gateway](https://vercel.com/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api/streaming?from=related&source_path=%2Fdocs%2Fai-gateway%2Fsdks-and-apis%2Fanthropic-messages-api%2Fimages&source_site=vercel-docs&relationship=related) — Stream Anthropic Messages API responses token by token as they are generated through AI Gateway. - [OpenAI Chat Completions Images and PDFs with AI Gateway](https://vercel.com/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/openai-chat-completions/images?from=related&source_path=%2Fdocs%2Fai-gateway%2Fsdks-and-apis%2Fanthropic-messages-api%2Fimages&source_site=vercel-docs&relationship=related) — Send images and PDF documents to a model using the OpenAI Chat Completions API through AI Gateway. - [OpenResponses Images and PDFs with AI Gateway](https://vercel.com/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/openresponses/images?from=related&source_path=%2Fdocs%2Fai-gateway%2Fsdks-and-apis%2Fanthropic-messages-api%2Fimages&source_site=vercel-docs&relationship=related) — Send images and PDF documents for analysis using the OpenResponses API through AI Gateway. - [Anthropic Messages Tool Calling with AI Gateway](https://vercel.com/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api/tool-calling?from=related&source_path=%2Fdocs%2Fai-gateway%2Fsdks-and-apis%2Fanthropic-messages-api%2Fimages&source_site=vercel-docs&relationship=related) — Use function calling with the Anthropic Messages API to allow models to call tools and functions through AI Gateway. Full cross-link map for this page: [/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api/images.graph.md](/docs/ai-gateway/sdks-and-apis/anthropic-messages-api/images.graph.md?from=related&source_path=%2Fdocs%2Fai-gateway%2Fsdks-and-apis%2Fanthropic-messages-api%2Fimages&source_site=vercel-docs&relationship=graph) Example request #### TypeScript ```typescript filename="file-attachment.ts" import Anthropic from '@anthropic-ai/sdk'; import fs from 'node:fs'; const apiKey = process.env.AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY || process.env.VERCEL_OIDC_TOKEN; const anthropic = new Anthropic({ apiKey, baseURL: 'https://ai-gateway.vercel.sh', }); // Read files as base64 const pdfData = fs.readFileSync('./document.pdf'); const imageData = fs.readFileSync('./image.png'); const pdfBase64 = pdfData.toString('base64'); const imageBase64 = imageData.toString('base64'); const message = await anthropic.messages.create({ model: 'anthropic/claude-opus-5', max_tokens: 1024, messages: [ { role: 'user', content: [ { type: 'document', source: { type: 'base64', media_type: 'application/pdf', data: pdfBase64, }, }, { type: 'image', source: { type: 'base64', media_type: 'image/png', data: imageBase64, }, }, { type: 'text', text: 'Please summarize the PDF and describe the image.', }, ], }, ], }); for (const block of message.content) { if (block.type === 'text') console.log('Response:', block.text); } ``` #### Python ```python filename="file-attachment.py" import os import base64 import anthropic api_key = os.getenv('AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY') or os.getenv('VERCEL_OIDC_TOKEN') client = anthropic.Anthropic( api_key=api_key, base_url='https://ai-gateway.vercel.sh' ) # Read files as base64 with open('./document.pdf', 'rb') as f: pdf_base64 = base64.b64encode(f.read()).decode('utf-8') with open('./image.png', 'rb') as f: image_base64 = base64.b64encode(f.read()).decode('utf-8') message = client.messages.create( model='anthropic/claude-opus-5', max_tokens=1024, messages=[ { 'role': 'user', 'content': [ { 'type': 'document', 'source': { 'type': 'base64', 'media_type': 'application/pdf', 'data': pdf_base64, }, }, { 'type': 'image', 'source': { 'type': 'base64', 'media_type': 'image/png', 'data': image_base64, }, }, { 'type': 'text', 'text': 'Please summarize the PDF and describe the image.', }, ], } ], ) for block in message.content: if block.type == "text": print('Response:', block.text) ``` #### cURL ```bash filename="attachments.sh" PDF_B64=$(base64 -i document.pdf) IMAGE_B64=$(base64 -i image.png) curl -X POST "https://ai-gateway.vercel.sh/v1/messages" \ -H "Authorization: Bearer $AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY" \ -H "Content-Type: application/json" \ -d '{ "model": "anthropic/claude-opus-5", "max_tokens": 1024, "messages": [ { "role": "user", "content": [ { "type": "document", "source": { "type": "base64", "media_type": "application/pdf", "data": "'"$PDF_B64"'" } }, { "type": "image", "source": { "type": "base64", "media_type": "image/png", "data": "'"$IMAGE_B64"'" } }, { "type": "text", "text": "What do this document and image show?" } ] } ] }' ``` ### Supported file types - **Images**: `image/jpeg`, `image/png`, `image/gif`, `image/webp` - **Documents**: `application/pdf` --- [View full sitemap](/docs/sitemap)