Apple Notes Will Gain Markdown Export at WWDC, and, I Have Thoughts
214 comments
·June 5, 2025dotdi
neilv
Agreed. For me, the popularity of Markdown on (pre-Microsoft) GitHub and GitLab was all I needed, to declare that the company wiki, code-embedded API docs, and anything else appropriate should just use Markdown.
Markdown is good enough for most of the documentation that software engineers do (other than diagrams), they already have to know it, and I don't want yet-another-markup-language to be a barrier to capturing and communicating institutional knowledge.
I also tell people that, if you're new to Markdown, even a plain text approximation that doesn't quite format correctly is strongly encouraged, so long as they capture the info somewhere accessible. I'll even offer to cheerfully fix the missing/bad Markdown, so that we have working docs and people can learn the very few parts of Markdown they missed; it's really not much.
(I personally have heavily used many much-much better technical documentation systems, and helped develop a WYSIWYG-ish SGML-based one professionally, but just using Markdown is a no-brainer right now. There are much more important things I want people learning and doing, than N different ways of minimally formatting documentation in N different places.)
jve
> other than diagrams
Works fine with some help https://mermaid.live/ https://github.blog/developer-skills/github/include-diagrams...
haiku2077
No, mermaid is not fine. You don't have fine control over layout and composition, you can't place your own media and annotations where you like, you can't even use the correct icons for things like databases and cloud services. I usually go into Figma for anything more complex than about 7 entities or if I need to tell a story with composition.
1bpp
Is there a reason you specify pre-Microsoft GitHub?
Spooky23
Markdown is like the new WordPerfect for some people, who want expressive written paths to format text.
Like with WordPerfect, there are people who get great utility (attorneys in WP, developers with Markdown), but 80-95% of people don’t get anything out of it.
It’s also one of those things where the constraints are an advantage. Markdown is great for internet facing text content, while many aspects of the mainstream wysiwyg editors are really descended from solutions for placing text on paper.
darkteflon
Former lawyer here. That most commercial contract work is done in Word is a source of major frustration and wasted time for many lawyers. Others are simply unaware that there are any authoring/editing paradigms that allow one to separate the drudgery of getting document formatting just-so, from the actual value-additive work.
Unfortunately there’s no realistic solution to the lock-in, so wrestling with broken paragraph formatting, mismatched text sizes, auto-numbering errors, etc at 2am before a client deadline remains the norm. One of the most frustrating parts of the job.
EasyMark
I never have those issues, but I'm the only one editing my stuff. I use styles religiously when I use Word for professional documents. It takes a little more time and effort but pays out over the long haul.
kayodelycaon
Do you use the comment and change tracking features of Word?
I write stories and everyone uses Word documents for editing.
carlosjobim
What's the problem with Word documents if you open them in Word?
bombcar
Those 80% sometimes DO get something out of it - when the resident nerd can fix their broken document because it’s Markdown or WordPerfect.
Just because I can’t fix my car doesn’t mean I want an unfixable car.
Spooky23
Agreed, but that’s the tension.
There’s no free lunch. On the flip, that user wants the complex features of the platform, and exposing them to a markup language takes elegant markdown and turns it into html or ooxml.
Telemakhos
Attorneys and architects loved Word Perfect because it did line numbers better than any other software. I'm really surprised that MS didn't pick up on that and improve Word's line numbering: it's a vital feature for a number of professions.
dctoedt
> Attorneys and architects loved Word Perfect because it did line numbers better than any other software.
Lawyer here: I loved WordPerfect (for DOS) because of Reveal Codes and its easy keystroke macros, which let me write an Emacs keyboard emulator for it. (Yes, I eventually did one for Microsoft Word for Windows, which I use to this day.)
packetlost
idk, a lot of non-devs use chat programs that use (a subset of) Markdown for rich text even if they don't know what that is.
soulofmischief
Its the new BBCode.
empath75
It's also great for writing documentation in a plaintext IDE, which I think is what _really_ drove a lot of the adoption.
diggan
> which I think is what _really_ drove a lot of the adoption
That GitHub used it as a "native" format everywhere from the beginning (as far as I remember), probably helped Markdown become at least as popular (or maybe even more) as GitHub itself.
Then everyone and their mother started doing static blogs, and since people already wrote their READMEs and issue comments with Markdown, I guess it was natural to want to write your blogposts with Markdown too, just like Gruber.
bsimpson
Don't overlook Reddit as a major reason for many otherwise-non-technical people to learn Markdown.
minimaxir
> Then everyone and their mother started doing static blogs
It helps that Jekyll, one such static blog, was also pushed by GitHub back in the day.
EasyMark
It's simple but has good enough capabilities and it's available in a universal format (plain text) that will never expire or get sold or become inaccessible
EasyMark
I love the relative simplicity of core markdown with if I need to get fancy to add some html (which is rare) and it works so well in programs like Joplin, rather than fighting weird formatting in programs like OneNote and EverNote
eviks
1. That's solved via readily available exports, so no need to pay the markup price 2. Same thing + other open formats exist
addicted
Another nice thing about markdown is that you can pick up the formatting even if reading the markdown in plaintext.
So lists look exactly how you would expect lists to look like if you were writing it on a piece of paper.
Italic/Bolds are surrounded by /* which convey emphasis even in plaintext.
Headings prefixed by # is a reasonable way to depict headings in plaintext and convey the intention immediately even if you don't know Markdown.
eduction
Many formats these days are cleartext. Microsoft Office documents and LibreOffice documents, to name two collections of formats, are both xml based. Not to mention HTML, Latex - the list is long. Markdown is fine but overused, to the point where even the creator is now warning it’s not for everything.
modernerd
He's right: Markdown was built for web editing in an era where physical keyboards outnumbered virtual ones. It doesn't really make sense for Notes outside of export.
There's little benefit to it as an input system on iOS/iPadOS (likely the dominant platforms for Notes) where formatting menus are just as close as `#` and `_` characters.
Several Markdown rules wouldn't make sense in the context of Notes. e.g. "end a line with two or more spaces then press return to create a <br>", which was designed to accommodate manually hard-wrapped text that Notes users likely don't want. Apple would have to follow something like CommonMark (feels unlikely) or implement their own Apple-flavoured Markdown, leaving you to learn what's supported and discover the quirks — kind of like its partial implementation of vim input in Xcode.
Popular Markdown apps seem to have converged on 'edit on line focus, preview on line blur', which is surely what the Notes app would do, because modal editing with preview and edit modes feels un-Appleish. 'Preview on line blur' _is_ nicer than a separate preview mode if you're a Markdown power user, but it still leaves many quirks you have to learn. (Just today I wrote, '# Thoughts on C#' in Obsidian, which reads ok with the cursor on that line until I pressed enter and the preview became, 'Thoughts on C'. Leaving me to learn I was supposed to know to write '#Thoughts on C\#' in the edit mode.)
woah
I use markdown all the time on iOS with Notion. It functions as a shortcut for formatting operations like creating headings and bullets.
inopinatus
Do iOS devices still default to translating consecutive spaces into “. “ within a few seconds? Always used to be a bother when authoring md content on an iPad.
double0jimb0
That can be disabled [0] (and I feel like has been on option for many years now).
kmelve
I wrote a piece a few years ago that still reflects a lot of my thoughts on the tension between Markdown as a format and the actual experience of writing and publishing on the web: [“Thoughts on Markdown” – Smashing Magazine](https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2022/02/thoughts-on-markdow...).
What Apple seems to be doing with Notes—embracing Markdown syntax but not treating it as a source format—feels like a pragmatic move. It acknowledges Markdown’s familiarity without overcommitting to it as a canonical format. That distinction matters: many people like typing emphasis or `code`, but few need or want to version-control or export that exact syntax. It’s the gesture of Markdown that carries value for most users, not the fidelity to a plain-text artifact. "Even" Google Docs implemented it recently.
In my article, I argue that Markdown is increasingly a “source language” for interfaces, not documents, and this Apple Notes move seems to align with that trend. Curious how others feel about Markdown as an authoring experience vs. a content format.
marxisttemp
See also SwiftUI’s AttributedString, which can be directly instantiated from a string literal containing Markdown syntax.
Pulcinella
Nitpick: AttributedString is a member of the Swift Foundation framework. It's not limited to SwiftUI.
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/foundation/attribu...
larrywright
I don’t want Notes to become a Markdown editor. I think that would be confusing for the majority of users. What I would like is for it to understand Markdown syntax and just convert it to the right thing. If I type “# My Note”, it should convert that to note title format. If I type “## Heading” it should convert it to a heading format, and so on.
Most apps do this already, to some extent. If you start a line with a - or an *, the app will convert it to a proper indented list. Heck, even Microsoft’s apps do this. I’m just asking for it to handle a few more things.
diggan
> I don’t want Notes to become a Markdown editor
> I’m just asking for it to handle a few more things.
How is what you're asking for not making Notes into a Markdown editor? Those are all features that come from Markdown, and the reason "most apps" already handle those, is because they're aiming to support Markdown to at least some extent.
jeeyoungk
I think the parent's suggesting that they should be "one way" shortcuts; i.e. "# Heading" auto-formatting as a heading is a shortcut, and it doesn't allow you to go back and modify the original markdown.
larrywright
That's exactly it.
larrywright
MS Word is not aiming to support Markdown.
mcdow
Kinda stoked for this. Been working on a notes app and apple notes is my current daily driver. Apple notes stores the notes in a proprietary and opaque format atm. I’ve been scheming ways to break the notes out without luck. Now I can just wait for this feature to come out.
cloverich
Was also in your boat, but realized there are various tools to export Apple notes as markdown that work reasonably well; Obsidian itself recommends one[1]. Meanwhile, I'm impressed that Apple notes keeps getting better. It was _almost_ good enough for me to abandon my own note taking app. The things that slowly drove me nuts were lack of real code formatting and lack of image formatting (after they added note linking and tagging, the prior issues I had). I'm still surprised how long it takes most notes apps to get decent out of the box image formatting; few would want to drop an image onto their note and have it blown up to take up the full page by default. Just make your notes app look like the typical blog by default and _most_ people will love it[2].
[1]: https://help.obsidian.md/import/apple-notes. [2]: tbf it took me quite a bit of work to get there in my own app, and its still got bugs
alisadev
Maybe you could try these:
Export notes by folder: https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/3aed9f1608ce4efeb31a276ad02...
Export all notes: https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/1b305195692e42c19d258989475...
Notes to html: https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/1a61fe549b7c41d7b2e3511ee12...
mcdow
Oh cool, thanks!!! I’ve heard of other people getting good value out of Shortcuts. Now I can give it a shot.
halpow
Why keep using Notes if if it hurts you so much that they're not markdown-exportable?
I haven't used Notes in decades other than to type out junk/numbers once every 4 months.
runjake
> Why keep using Notes if if it hurts you so much that they're not markdown-exportable?
Among other reasons, because the sync experience is second to none.
Some of the other reasons:
- Apple Pencil
- Shared notes with friends and family (vacation planning, lists, etc)
mcdow
So first of all, I like Apple notes for its simplicity and ability to sync with iCloud. I don't really care if it's exportable using markdown, I only really care that it is exportable. Because I'd like to migrate to the notes app I am working on.
mensetmanusman
I have had flawless success converting screenshots into formatted text with llms
suobset
The biggest thing that excites me about this is the fact that other Apple Notes export formats absolutely suck at the moment. You have PDF, and Pages. One's not editable, the other is a proprietary format that will lose formatting if converted to ODF or Word and is clunky in general.
mark_l_watson
I love Apple notes and being able to export to Markdown is useful for generating LLM context and for vender neutral backup. I hope there is an Export All Notes option.
cadamsdotcom
Markdown is a great storage format for notes. The precision of editing in Markdown makes it easy to be certain your indenting is correct, or do weird things that are actually common, like having a sub-list that switches from bullets to numbers or from numbers to bullets.
iambateman
It makes sense that Markdown is a good tool for a specific purpose, and generalized note taking isn't it.
As an aside, I have a dream that Apple Notes could be piped into a website as a form of blogging. As it is, I haven't found a way to do it...
chrisweekly
"Markdown is a good tool for a specific purpose, and generalized note taking isn't it."
As someone who enjoys note-taking in Obsidian (by far my favorite super-powered markdown editor), I respectfully disagree with the premise and conclusion. On the contrary, IME, MD isn't single-purpose, and it absolutely can and does serve as a first-rate format for note-taking.
iambateman
I'm not trying to take Obsidian away from you...but I'm also not trying to sign my Grandma up for Obsidian :D
nomad41
There’s https://alto.so/ that does exactly what you want.
msgodel
I take my notes in INI format with a lose schema, as I accumulate data I tend to move towards something more concrete and write tools for it. I think this is the absolute best compromise between some kind of formal personal ERP-like (PRP?) system and something super loose like Markdown or org mode.
Of course doing this on an iPhone is an absolute nightmare because everything has to be blessed by Apple and you can't just do one-off ad-hoc automations or usefully compose tooling that touches the filesystem. Everything has to be canned and sharecropped (at best) so them adding Markdown to the only text editor that supports fast, energy efficient background sync is a huge deal.
When I had an iPhone I did try doing some server-side automation with the SGML-like (can't remember if it was actual HTML or not) format notes used. Like most of those sorts of things it was a miserable uphill fight to get value out of the thing. I've been so happy ever since I've completely given up on anything smartphone related.
jhayward
Did you ever test drive the Drafts app? It is remarkably easy to build customized workflows, both editing and document processing, and is built to be glue between different document/message apps.
msgodel
It's a little late for that now since I don't own a smartphone anymore but it looks like there isn't a Linux version so the usefulness to me would have been limited anyway.
Zak
I like my Markdown notes editor, but I agree it's not the right choice for Apple notes because exposing the underlying machinery in everyday use is not Apple's style.
wodenokoto
It’s also not handy to reach the mark-up characters from a touch keyboard. And if you are adding backticks and asterisks to a markup bar, you might as well just add bold and italics to the markup bar.
Zak
This varies a bit by touch keyboard. The standard iPhone keyboard is particularly bad at this while the AOSP and Google keyboards on Android aren't so bad.
Joplin, the notes app I've been using lately does have a markup bar with those features.
criddell
It does feel like a good option for export though (as John says in the post).
devrsi0n
That was my dream once upon a time. I put my blood, sweat, and tears into making it happen. Check out my indie product: https://quotion.co
themadturk
Also https://quotion.co/ for Notes to blog.
jhardy54
I think you want Alto / Montaigne (spelling?). They’re both made by the same person IIRC.
jbverschoor
Fully agree. Obsidian, NotePlan, etc. are popular because their storage format is markdown, and you have access to the files, EVEN without exporting
Markdown on iOS doesn’t even make very much sense in terms of keyboard strokes
deverman
Markdown is now the go to baseline for importing and exporting text data. I can see how I might want to export some more personal Notes to DayOne and archive some notes I don't need anymore to a more durable storage format. Would welcome this functionality.
dstroot
Obsidian user here. BUT I also have a lot of stuff in Apple Notes. Have wanted to consolidate but always seemed to much of a chore. This is awesome for my use case. Kudos to Apple for adding this!
When Gruber mentions that he never uses Markdown outside of his blog, and hinting at the fact that it was not intended for text editors (and other apps), there's one important point I want to make.
Yes, Markdown has disadvantages, and a few rough edges for uses as the format for editors et al, but there are two very big advantages and/or sideffects of it's widespread use: (1) it's cleartext and therefore very good as a measure against vendor lock-in and (2) it has, to some extent, dampened the rampant "not-invented-here"-esqe tendency to use proprietary formats. Even in open-source apps, proprietary formats make it hard for non-dev users to get their stuff out. If it's markdown (or at least supports markdown export) from the beginning, at least you know you can take your data with you.