UnmarkedOur pick
On a Mac, pick Unmarked. It writes in place as you type, then adds a separate Read view, full-screen slides and Word files with real equations in them, free and with nothing else to install. Pick Typora if you also work on Windows or Linux, or want themes you write in CSS.
| Question | Unmarked | Typora |
|---|---|---|
| Writing | Formatted in place while you type. Markdown marks fade, then return at the cursor | Live Preview renders Markdown in place while you type |
| Reading | A separate Read view with the editor gone | One surface for writing and reading |
| Equations | In Write you see the LaTeX. Read, Present, PDF and Word give you the equation itself | Typeset live while you write, with optional automatic numbering |
| Tables | Edited on a grid, whole ranges at once, with rich copy and row and column controls | Toolbar size and alignment, ⌘Enter for a new row, drag a border to move a row or column |
| Slides and Word | Present for slides. Word, PDF and HTML come straight from the app | PDF, HTML and image built in. Word, EPUB and RevealJS slides go through Pandoc, installed separately |
| Platforms and styling | Mac only. Built-in light and dark themes, with separate reading and writing fonts | macOS, Windows and Linux. Themes are CSS you can edit |
| Price | Free | $14.99 before tax for up to 3 devices, after a 15-day trial |
When you stop typing, the editor can leave
Typora and Unmarked start from the same idea. Markdown marks stay out of the way while you write, so the page already looks like the document it will become. In Typora, that one surface is also where you read.
Unmarked has a separate one, called Read, and ⌘E is the switch. The window shows only the finished page, with no marks anywhere. Links work, checking off a task writes the change to the file, local images zoom when clicked and Mermaid code shows up as a diagram. ⌘E again and you're back in Write.
That's the view for files you read more than you write: release notes someone asked you to check, a handbook page, the summary an AI assistant saved next to your code.
A deck and a .docx, no Pandoc required
Present (⌥⌘P) turns every H1 and H2 into a full-screen slide. Tables, colored code, equations and diagrams appear as they do in Read, and Esc drops you back into the section you were presenting. There's no separate deck to rebuild when the text changes.
Typora has no presentation mode, and its built-in exports are PDF, HTML and image. Slides (a RevealJS export) and Word both go through Pandoc, which you install first. Unmarked writes the .docx itself, with Word heading styles, real lists, tables you can keep editing and equations you can change in Word.
Tables past the single cell
Unmarked keeps its row and column controls on the grid, and it also works on ranges. Drag out a range, or build one from the keyboard. Delete empties it, Paste fills it and Copy carries both a Markdown and a rich-text version.
Which one fits your work?
Choose Unmarked if
- You want one view for typing and a separate one for reading the result.
- The document you write is also the deck you present.
- You send .docx files with equations and tables and would rather not install Pandoc to make them.
- You only work on a Mac and don't want to pay $14.99 for an editor.
Choose Typora only if
- You move between a Mac and a Windows or Linux PC and want one editor on all of them.
- You want equations typeset while you type and numbered automatically, or themes you write in CSS.