How to Convert Markdown to HTML
Enter Markdown and switch between the live preview and generated HTML. Copy the HTML for your publishing workflow. Review output in the actual destination because Markdown dialects and site styles can differ.
Markdown Syntax Supported
Headings, emphasis, links, lists, blockquotes and fenced code blocks are supported. Syntax that looks like HTML can also appear in Markdown source. Keep the distinction between source text, generated markup and safe embedding clear.
GitHub-Flavored Markdown
The converter enables GitHub-flavored Markdown features such as pipe tables, task lists and strikethrough. This does not reproduce every GitHub platform feature, extension or stylesheet. Test complex tables and nested lists.
Live Preview and Generated HTML
The preview runs in an isolated sandbox with a restrictive content policy. The copied generated HTML is not sanitized and should be sanitized before embedding untrusted content elsewhere. The preview does not authorize scripts or remote resource loading.
Markdown vs HTML
Markdown is a writing syntax that becomes HTML. HTML provides a richer document model and can include active content. Conversion is not validation of links, accessibility or content safety in the destination application.
More examples and technical details
What Markdown Is and Why It Stuck
Markdown is a plain-text formatting syntax that John Gruber created in 2004 with Aaron Swartz. The whole idea is that the source should be readable as-is. You do not stare at a wall of angle brackets to figure out what the text says; you just read it, the way you would read an email. A hash means a heading, asterisks mean emphasis, and a hyphen starts a list. That is most of it.
Developers adopted it for reasons that go beyond looks. Because a Markdown file is plain text, it lives happily in Git, so every edit shows up as a clean line-by-line diff in code review. It is portable, opening in any editor on any operating system, and it will still be readable in twenty years when today's word processor formats are long forgotten. That combination of human-friendly and machine-friendly is why READMEs, changelogs, and documentation almost all run on it now.
Markdown Syntax Cheat Sheet
You can learn the practical core in a couple of minutes. Here is the syntax that covers the vast majority of what people write day to day.
| Element | Syntax |
|---|---|
| Heading | # H1 ## H2 ### H3 |
| Bold | **bold text** |
| Italic | _italic text_ |
| Link | [text](https://url) |
| Image |  |
| Inline code | `const x = 1` |
| Code block | ``` fenced block ``` |
| List | - item or 1. item |
| Blockquote | > quoted line |
| Horizontal rule | --- |
| Table | | col | col | |
CommonMark vs GitHub Flavored Markdown
The original spec left some corners ambiguous, so different tools rendered the same file differently. CommonMark is the community effort to pin down one precise, unambiguous specification, and it is what most serious parsers target today. GitHub Flavored Markdown, or GFM, builds on CommonMark and adds the features people kept asking for: tables, task lists with checkboxes, strikethrough with double tildes, and automatic linking of bare URLs.
In practice you will meet Markdown almost everywhere text is entered. GitHub and GitLab, Reddit comments, Discord messages, Notion, Obsidian, and every static site generator from Jekyll to Hugo to Astro all speak it. Learn it once and you can format text in a dozen apps without touching a mouse.
The converter above turns your Markdown into clean, standard HTML you can paste straight into a web page, a CMS, or an email template. Everything is processed locally in your browser, so an unpublished draft never leaves your machine.
Need something else? Explore every text tool in one place, all free and client-side.
Frequently asked questions
How do I convert Markdown to HTML?
Type Markdown, select HTML to inspect the generated markup and copy it.
Does the converter support GitHub-Flavored Markdown?
Yes. Common GFM features are enabled, but not every GitHub-specific platform feature.
Can I preview the rendered output?
Yes. The Preview tab renders it in an isolated sandbox.
Is generated HTML sanitized?
No. The generated HTML is raw converter output. The preview is sandboxed; sanitize untrusted HTML before embedding it elsewhere.
Is my Markdown uploaded?
No. Input is processed in this browser tab and is not uploaded by the tool. Copy and download are actions you control; ordinary page analytics do not receive tool input.