Creating a BLOB from a Base64 string in JavaScript

Question

I have Base64-encoded binary data in a string:

const contentType = \'image/png\';
const b64Data = \'iVBORw0KGg         


        

Answer 1

For all copy-paste lovers out there like me, here is a cooked download function which works on Chrome, Firefox and Edge:

window.saveFile = function (bytesBase64, mimeType, fileName) {
var fileUrl = "data:" + mimeType + ";base64," + bytesBase64;
fetch(fileUrl)
    .then(response => response.blob())
    .then(blob => {
        var link = window.document.createElement("a");
        link.href = window.URL.createObjectURL(blob, { type: mimeType });
        link.download = fileName;
        document.body.appendChild(link);
        link.click();
        document.body.removeChild(link);
    });
}

Answer 2

Here is a more minimal method without any dependencies or libraries.
It requires the new fetch API. (Can I use it?)

var url = "data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAAFCAYAAACNbyblAAAAHElEQVQI12P4//8/w38GIAXDIBKE0DHxgljNBAAO9TXL0Y4OHwAAAABJRU5ErkJggg=="

fetch(url)
.then(res => res.blob())
.then(console.log)

With this method you can also easily get a ReadableStream, ArrayBuffer, text, and JSON.
(fyi this also works with node-fetch in Node)

As a function:

const b64toBlob = (base64, type = 'application/octet-stream') => 
  fetch(`data:${type};base64,${base64}`).then(res => res.blob())

---

I did a simple performance test towards Jeremy's ES6 sync version.
The sync version will block UI for a while. keeping the devtool open can slow the fetch performance

document.body.innerHTML += '<input autofocus placeholder="try writing">'
// get some dummy gradient image
var img=function(){var a=document.createElement("canvas"),b=a.getContext("2d"),c=b.createLinearGradient(0,0,1500,1500);a.width=a.height=3000;c.addColorStop(0,"red");c.addColorStop(1,"blue");b.fillStyle=c;b.fillRect(0,0,a.width,a.height);return a.toDataURL()}();


async function perf() {
  
  const blob = await fetch(img).then(res => res.blob())
  // turn it to a dataURI
  const url = img
  const b64Data = url.split(',')[1]

  // Jeremy Banks solution
  const b64toBlob = (b64Data, contentType = '', sliceSize=512) => {
    const byteCharacters = atob(b64Data);
    const byteArrays = [];
    
    for (let offset = 0; offset < byteCharacters.length; offset += sliceSize) {
      const slice = byteCharacters.slice(offset, offset + sliceSize);
      
      const byteNumbers = new Array(slice.length);
      for (let i = 0; i < slice.length; i++) {
        byteNumbers[i] = slice.charCodeAt(i);
      }
      
      const byteArray = new Uint8Array(byteNumbers);
      
      byteArrays.push(byteArray);
    }
    
    const blob = new Blob(byteArrays, {type: contentType});
    return blob;
  }

  // bench blocking method
  let i = 500
  console.time('b64')
  while (i--) {
    await b64toBlob(b64Data)
  }
  console.timeEnd('b64')
  
  // bench non blocking
  i = 500

  // so that the function is not reconstructed each time
  const toBlob = res => res.blob()
  console.time('fetch')
  while (i--) {
    await fetch(url).then(toBlob)
  }
  console.timeEnd('fetch')
  console.log('done')
}

perf()

Answer 3

I'm posting a more declarative way of sync Base64 converting. While async fetch().blob() is very neat and I like this solution a lot, it doesn't work on Internet Explorer 11 (and probably Edge - I haven't tested this one), even with the polyfill - take a look at my comment to Endless' post for more details.

const blobPdfFromBase64String = base64String => {
   const byteArray = Uint8Array.from(
     atob(base64String)
       .split('')
       .map(char => char.charCodeAt(0))
   );
  return new Blob([byteArray], { type: 'application/pdf' });
};

Bonus

If you want to print it you could do something like:

const isIE11 = !!(window.navigator && window.navigator.msSaveOrOpenBlob); // Or however you want to check it
const printPDF = blob => {
   try {
     isIE11
       ? window.navigator.msSaveOrOpenBlob(blob, 'documents.pdf')
       : printJS(URL.createObjectURL(blob)); // http://printjs.crabbly.com/
   } catch (e) {
     throw PDFError;
   }
};

Bonus x 2 - Opening a BLOB file in new tab for Internet Explorer 11

If you're able to do some preprocessing of the Base64 string on the server you could expose it under some URL and use the link in printJS :)

Answer 4

If you can stand adding one dependency to your project there's the great blob-util npm package that provides a handy base64StringToBlob function. Once added to your package.json you can use it like this:

import { base64StringToBlob } from 'blob-util';

const contentType = 'image/png';
const b64Data = 'iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAUAAAAFCAYAAACNbyblAAAAHElEQVQI12P4//8/w38GIAXDIBKE0DHxgljNBAAO9TXL0Y4OHwAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==';

const blob = base64StringToBlob(b64Data, contentType);

// Do whatever you need with your blob...

Answer 5

I noticed that Internet Explorer 11 gets incredibly slow when slicing the data like Jeremy suggested. This is true for Chrome, but Internet Explorer seems to have a problem when passing the sliced data to the Blob-Constructor. On my machine, passing 5 MB of data makes Internet Explorer crash and memory consumption is going through the roof. Chrome creates the blob in no time.

Run this code for a comparison:

var byteArrays = [],
    megaBytes = 2,
    byteArray = new Uint8Array(megaBytes*1024*1024),
    block,
    blobSlowOnIE, blobFastOnIE,
    i;

for (i = 0; i < (megaBytes*1024); i++) {
    block = new Uint8Array(1024);
    byteArrays.push(block);
}

//debugger;

console.profile("No Slices");
blobSlowOnIE = new Blob(byteArrays, { type: 'text/plain'});
console.profileEnd();

console.profile("Slices");
blobFastOnIE = new Blob([byteArray], { type: 'text/plain'});
console.profileEnd();

So I decided to include both methods described by Jeremy in one function. Credits go to him for this.

function base64toBlob(base64Data, contentType, sliceSize) {

    var byteCharacters,
        byteArray,
        byteNumbers,
        blobData,
        blob;

    contentType = contentType || '';

    byteCharacters = atob(base64Data);

    // Get BLOB data sliced or not
    blobData = sliceSize ? getBlobDataSliced() : getBlobDataAtOnce();

    blob = new Blob(blobData, { type: contentType });

    return blob;


    /*
     * Get BLOB data in one slice.
     * => Fast in Internet Explorer on new Blob(...)
     */
    function getBlobDataAtOnce() {
        byteNumbers = new Array(byteCharacters.length);

        for (var i = 0; i < byteCharacters.length; i++) {
            byteNumbers[i] = byteCharacters.charCodeAt(i);
        }

        byteArray = new Uint8Array(byteNumbers);

        return [byteArray];
    }

    /*
     * Get BLOB data in multiple slices.
     * => Slow in Internet Explorer on new Blob(...)
     */
    function getBlobDataSliced() {

        var slice,
            byteArrays = [];

        for (var offset = 0; offset < byteCharacters.length; offset += sliceSize) {
            slice = byteCharacters.slice(offset, offset + sliceSize);

            byteNumbers = new Array(slice.length);

            for (var i = 0; i < slice.length; i++) {
                byteNumbers[i] = slice.charCodeAt(i);
            }

            byteArray = new Uint8Array(byteNumbers);

            // Add slice
            byteArrays.push(byteArray);
        }

        return byteArrays;
    }
}

Answer 6

See this example: https://jsfiddle.net/pqhdce2L/

function b64toBlob(b64Data, contentType, sliceSize) {
  contentType = contentType || '';
  sliceSize = sliceSize || 512;

  var byteCharacters = atob(b64Data);
  var byteArrays = [];

  for (var offset = 0; offset < byteCharacters.length; offset += sliceSize) {
    var slice = byteCharacters.slice(offset, offset + sliceSize);

    var byteNumbers = new Array(slice.length);
    for (var i = 0; i < slice.length; i++) {
      byteNumbers[i] = slice.charCodeAt(i);
    }

    var byteArray = new Uint8Array(byteNumbers);

    byteArrays.push(byteArray);
  }
    
  var blob = new Blob(byteArrays, {type: contentType});
  return blob;
}


var contentType = 'image/png';
var b64Data = Your Base64 encode;

var blob = b64toBlob(b64Data, contentType);
var blobUrl = URL.createObjectURL(blob);

var img = document.createElement('img');
img.src = blobUrl;
document.body.appendChild(img);