use IO::Compress::Gzip; my $compressed; my $z; $mech->add_handler( response_header => sub { my($response, $ua, $h) = @_; $response->{default_add_content} = 0; $z = new IO::Compress::Gzip \$compressed or die; } ); $mech->add_handler( response_data => sub { my($response, $ua, $h, $data) = @_; print $z $data or die $!; return 1; } ); $mech->add_handler( response_done => sub { my($response, $ua, $h) = @_; close $z or die $!; } ); $mech->get($pdf_url); warn length $mech->content; # 0 cause of the 'default_add_content' setting warn length $compressed;