> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://developers.lighton.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Download a document file

> Download a document file. Returns the original file by default. Use the purpose parameter to request a specific version (e.g. rendered_pdf for frontend viewers).



## OpenAPI

````yaml /api-reference/api-console.yaml get /api/v3/files/{id}/download
openapi: 3.1.0
info:
  title: LightOn API
  version: 3.9.0 (v1)
  description: >-
    LightOn gives you an API to search, parse, and ingest documents at scale.
    Build knowledge-retrieval pipelines without managing vector databases or OCR
    models.
servers:
  - url: https://api.lighton.ai
security: []
tags:
  - name: Ask
    description: >-
      Retrieval-augmented generation: search your indexed corpus and generate an
      LLM answer grounded in the retrieved passages. Supports streaming (SSE)
      and synchronous modes.
  - name: Search
    description: >-
      Hybrid vector + text retrieval over your indexed corpus. Returns ranked
      passages with provenance (file, page range, workspace). Optional reranking
      and vision mode.
  - name: Files
    description: Upload, list, fetch, and delete documents indexed in your workspaces.
  - name: Facets
    description: >-
      Organise documents with hierarchical content types and custom attributes
      per file. Start from starter templates or build your own classification
      schema from scratch.
  - name: Tags
    description: >-
      Manage flat, company-wide labels used to scope search and group content
      across workspaces.
  - name: Workspaces
    description: >-
      Create and manage workspaces — the access-controlled containers your
      documents live in.
  - name: Parse
    description: >-
      Convert documents into structured Markdown — PDFs, images, Office files,
      and HTML. Synchronous endpoint capped at 20 MB / 15 pages.
  - name: Extract
    description: >-
      Pull typed fields out of documents using a JSON Schema you provide. Sync
      mode for small documents (≤20 MB / 15 pages); async mode for larger jobs
      (≤100 MB / 1000 pages) with polling on a job ID.
  - name: API Keys
    description: >-
      Provision and revoke API keys used to authenticate against the Console
      API.
  - name: Models
    description: >-
      List, register, update, and delete custom ML models scoped to your
      company.
paths:
  /api/v3/files/{id}/download:
    get:
      tags:
        - Files
      summary: Download a document file
      description: >-
        Download a document file. Returns the original file by default. Use the
        purpose parameter to request a specific version (e.g. rendered_pdf for
        frontend viewers).
      operationId: api_v3_files_download_retrieve
      parameters:
        - in: path
          name: id
          schema:
            type: integer
          description: A unique integer value identifying this Document.
          required: true
        - in: query
          name: purpose
          schema:
            type: string
            enum:
              - original
              - rendered_pdf
              - transcript
          description: >-
            Which file version to serve. Defaults to 'original'. Falls back to
            'original' if the requested purpose has no associated file.
      responses:
        '200':
          description: Binary file content or sanitized markdown text
        '401':
          description: Authentication credentials were not provided
        '404':
          description: File not found or not accessible
        '422':
          content:
            application/json:
              schema:
                $ref: '#/components/schemas/APIV3ValidationErrorResponse'
              examples:
                ValidationError:
                  value:
                    id: null
                    code: 422
                    error: validation_error
                    detail: One or more fields failed validation.
                    doc_url: https://developers.lighton.ai/errors#validation_error
                    fields:
                      <field_name>:
                        - error: required
                          detail: This field is required.
                  summary: Validation Error
          description: Request body is valid JSON but one or more fields failed validation
      security:
        - bearerAuth: []
components:
  schemas:
    APIV3ValidationErrorResponse:
      type: object
      properties:
        id:
          type:
            - string
            - 'null'
          description: >-
            Job/resource id when one already exists (useful for async error
            diagnosis); null otherwise.
        code:
          type: integer
          description: HTTP status code
        error:
          type: string
          description: Error code used by the UI as a translation key
        detail:
          type: string
          description: Human-readable error message for developers
        doc_url:
          type: string
          description: Link to the error-code documentation page
        fields:
          type: object
          additionalProperties:
            type: array
            items:
              $ref: '#/components/schemas/APIV3FieldError'
          description: Field-level validation errors keyed by field name
      required:
        - code
        - detail
        - doc_url
        - error
        - id
    APIV3FieldError:
      type: object
      properties:
        error:
          type: string
          description: Error code / translation key
        detail:
          type: string
          description: Human-readable description of the field error
      required:
        - detail
        - error
  securitySchemes:
    bearerAuth:
      type: http
      scheme: bearer
      description: >-
        Bearer authentication header of the form `Bearer <token>`, where
        `<token>` is your auth token.

````