What file uses .md extension and how should I edit them?

926
votes

On GitHub, several projects have README.md files. It seems like a simple format file to express text and pictures.

I guess there is an editor or syntax explanation somewhere.

Where can I find an introduction to .md files?

16
markdownfile-extension
I guess this is evidence in favor of using the .markdown extension instead, though it's so awfully long... – endolith
Here is a link that may help you -> .MD File Extension – Vipin Kr. Singh
MarkPad is a nice application for MarkDown editing in Windows. It presents you with the preview of the edits. – skjoshi
User can try MarkView, a Chrome extension for editing and viewing markdown file inside the browser. – swcool
Full guide to help you start with markdown: blog.wax-o.com/2014/04/…. You should try to write markdown with a way to live visualizing the result (with an application like mouapp.com). Did you know that stackoverflow post and comment syntax is based on markdown ? :) stackoverflow.com/editing-help – fabien

16 Answers

771
votes

Markdown is a plain-text file format. The extensions .md and .markdown are just text files written in Markdown syntax. If you have a Readme.md in your repo, GitHub will show the contents on the home page of your repo. Read the documentation:

You can edit the Readme.md file in GitHub itself. Click on Readme.md, you will find an edit button. You can preview your changes and even commit them from there.

Since it is a text file, Notepad or Notepad++ (Windows), TextEdit (Mac) or any other text editor can be used to edit and modify it. Specialized editors exist that automatically parse the markdown as you type it and generate a preview, while others apply various syntax coloring and decorations to the displayed text. In both cases though, the saved file is still a readable text file.

If you want to create an md file with preview and if you prefer not to install any special editors, you can use online editors like dillinger.io and stackedit.io. They provide live preview. You can also export your files to Google Drive or Dropbox.

89
votes

If you are looking for an editor, I suggest you use http://dillinger.io/. It is a simple browser-based text editor that can render Markdown on the fly.

However, if you prefer an app, and you are using OS X, you could try Mou. It is quite good and full of examples.

48
votes

Github's Atom text editor has a live-preview mode for markdown files.

The keyboard shortcut is CTRL+SHIFT+M.

It can be activated from the editor using the CTRL+SHIFT+M key-binding and is currently enabled for .markdown, .md, .mkd, .mkdown, and .ron files.

enter image description here

38
votes

Microsoft's Visual Studio Code text editor has built in support for .md files written in markdown syntax.

The syntax is automatically color-coded inside of the .md file, and a preview window of the rendered markdown can be viewed by pressing Shift+Ctrl+V (Windows) or Shift+Cmd+V (Mac).

To see them side-by-side, drag the preview tab to the right side of the editor, or use Ctrl+K V (Windows) or Cmd+K V (Mac) instead.

enter image description here

VS Code uses the marked library for parsing, and has Github Flavored Markdown support enabled by default, but it will not display the Github Emoji inline like Github's Atom text editor does.

Also, VS Code supports has several markdown plugins available for extended functionality.

17
votes

Extension '.md' refers to Markdown files.

If you don't want to install an app to read them in that format, you can simply use TextEdit or Xcode itself to open it on Mac.

On any other OS, you should be able to open it using any text editor, though as expected, you will not see it in Markdown format.

14
votes

Yup, just GitHub flavored Markdown. Including a README file in your repository will help others quickly determine what it's about and how to install it. Very helpful to include in your repos.

5
votes

Stack Edit is an online markdown editor with the ability to save to Google Drive and DropBox.

5
votes

Markdown is just a text file which optionally has .md, or .markdown extensions. It can be converted to HTML. To know syntax of Markdown, Check out

GitHub Flavored Markdown.

You can use any text editor for markdown. If you are sublime text user, you can check out Markdown Preview plugin which will display the rendered markdown content in browser and updates whenever you change the markdown file.

Some of the online markdown editor

4
votes

BBEdit will also display MD on the mac.

and here is a quicklook plugin to display them when you preview them.

3
votes

I suggest StackEdit. It is simple WISIWIG editor. You can use both editor and markdown syntax. There is a quick markdown help syntax there. Undo/redo, comments, GoogleDrive, Dropbox interconnection.

2
votes

markable.in is a very nice online tool for editing Markdown syntax

2
votes

There is an ongoing effort to standardize Markdown and as of now, this is probably the best place to learn about markdown:

http://standardmarkdown.com/

2
votes

If you are creating .md files for your .NET solutions I recommend the Visual Studio 2015 extension Markdown Editor as it has a preview panel so you can see your changes in real time.

EDIT: This also should now work with Visual Studio 2017.

0
votes

The easiest thing to do, if you do not have a reader, is to open the MD file with a text editor and then write the MD file out as an HTML file and then double click to view it with browser.

0
votes

The .md stands for Markdown Text. Basically, its just another type of text file, like .txt

I use Notepad++ for reading and editing these

0
votes

A .md file stands for a Markdown file extension. A popular app for editing these files is Typora