Download File after submission Contact Form 7 Wordpress

Question

I know how to redirect the form to another page after submitting a Contact form 7 build form in wordpress. So I can redirect it to a pdf file for example. ( it then opens in the browser)

But what I would like to have is a direct download upon submission. no redirect.

The code I use to redirect the form to the pdf file is:

on_sent_ok: "location = 'url to pdf file here';"

The perfect way it would be that the form will disappear and say a Thank you notice on the place of the form and start the download of the PDF file

Answer 1

You can force a pdf to be downloaded directly instead of being viewed on the server by adding this .htaccess file on the PDF directory.

.htaccess - this will force PDF to be downloaded

<FilesMatch "\.(?i:pdf)$">
   ForceType application/octet-stream
   Header set Content-Disposition attachment
</FilesMatch>

or you you can try javascript ( untested )

function force_download( file ) {
    pdf = window.open(file, '', 'left=100,screenX=100');
    pdf.document.execCommand('SaveAs', 'null', 'myfile.pdf');
    pdf.close();
 }
 on_sent_ok: "force_download('pdf_url_here');"

Answer 2

Since the on_sent_ok has been deprecated, here is an example you could use for inspiration. I had the need to add a download CTA after the content of all case studies of a website, but "in exchange" of user's data for:

• display a CF7 form on your page, I had the same one on all case studies post type single which I hooked after the content
• find a way to get the wanted PDF url for people to download, as for me all case studies have a different PDF, I simply added an ACF field, filtered on PDF only, which returns the file url
• based on CF7 Dom events , choose the action you prefer to make the dowload happens, as I am not sending any confirmation email, I prefer working on the wpcf7submit event. Note that wpcf7submit event is fired only if the form has been validated

So the code looks like this:

<?php 
// For simplicity, using an anonymous functions
add_action( 'wp_print_footer_scripts', function () {
    // Check the wanted singular post type loading
    if ( is_admin() || ! is_singular( 'case-study' ) ) {
        return;
    }

    // Check if the ACF PDF field is not empty for use
    $pdf_link = get_field( 'pdf' );
    if ( empty( $pdf_link ) ) {
        return;
    }

    // Hook on the "wpcf7submit" CF7 Dom event to force the download
    printf( "<script>document.addEventListener( 'wpcf7submit', function( event ) { window.open('%s'); }, false );</script>", $pdf_link );
} );