Markdown to HTML Converter

What Is the Markdown to HTML Converter?

Markdown is a lightweight text-formatting syntax widely used for README files, documentation, and blog content. This tool converts a common subset of Markdown -- headers, bold/italic text, links, inline code, lists, and fenced code blocks -- into HTML, with a live rendered preview alongside the generated markup.

How to Use This Tool

Type or paste Markdown. Both the generated HTML and a rendered preview update as you type.

Supported Markdown Syntax

Practical Uses

• Previewing how a README or documentation snippet will render as HTML
• Converting Markdown notes into HTML for pasting into a CMS or email
• Learning basic Markdown syntax with instant visual feedback

For converting HTML the other direction into a readable format, see the HTML Beautifier.

How Lines Become Blocks

The converter reads your Markdown one line at a time. A line starting with one to six hash marks and a space becomes a heading of that level. A line starting with a hyphen or an asterisk followed by a space becomes a list item in an unordered list, and a line beginning with digits, a period and a space becomes an item in an ordered list. Consecutive items are grouped into one list, which closes when a different kind of line appears. Any other non-blank line becomes its own paragraph. This is the key difference from full Markdown: two lines typed one after the other without a blank line between them become two separate paragraph elements, instead of being joined into one. Blank lines are simply skipped.

Worked Example

Suppose you type a hypothetical README fragment: a level-two heading called Install, a sentence saying to run the setup command, and then three hyphen items. The output is an h2 element, a p element, and a ul element with three li elements. If one item reads "Use **fast** mode", the double asterisks around fast become a strong element. A phrase in single asterisks becomes an em element, and text in single backticks becomes a code element. A link written as bracketed text followed by a parenthesized address becomes an anchor element with that address as its href.

Fenced Code Blocks

A line starting with three backticks toggles code mode. Everything until the next fence is copied into a pre and code pair as written, without Markdown formatting applied. One limitation matters a lot: the characters inside are not escaped, so a code sample containing angle brackets, such as an HTML tag, will be inserted as real markup. In the live preview this means the sample renders as elements rather than showing its source text. If you need to display HTML code samples, replace the angle brackets with their entity forms before converting. The same applies to ordinary text: a raw less-than sign in a paragraph is passed through as typed.

Details That Trip People Up

• Inline formatting is matched within a single line, so bold text that spans two lines will not convert.
• A list marker without the following space, such as a hyphen glued to the word, is treated as ordinary paragraph text.
• Indented sub-items are not nested; an indented hyphen line will not be recognized as a list item because the pattern requires the marker at the very start of the line.
• Images, tables, blockquotes, horizontal rules, strikethrough and hard line breaks are not supported and pass through as plain paragraph text.
• A single asterisk used as a bullet is safe, but asterisks used in the middle of a line, as in a multiplication such as 3*4*5, may be read as emphasis markers.

Safety When Publishing the Output

Since raw HTML in your source is passed through untouched, and link addresses are not checked, do not paste untrusted Markdown and then publish the generated HTML. Content from another person could contain script elements or links with harmful schemes. If you publish user-supplied text, run it through a dedicated, maintained Markdown library and an HTML sanitizer rather than relying on this lightweight converter.

Best Uses

The tool suits quick jobs: turning your own release notes or a short help article into clean markup, checking how a heading structure looks, or teaching someone the basic syntax with immediate feedback. For a long document, convert it in chunks and review the HTML for lines that should have been joined into one paragraph.

Frequently Asked Questions