Markdown Reader Docs
A reader, not a converter: open many Markdown files, or a whole folder, and read them in tabs with a live Table-of-Contents outline. Files render with the same sanitized engine as the rest of iLoveMD (DOMPurify), so opening a Markdown file you didn't write is safe. Mermaid diagrams render inline. Everything happens in your browser, nothing is uploaded.
Opening files
Four ways in, all local:
- Open files, pick one or many
.md / .markdown / .txt files; each opens in its own tab.
- Open folder, pick a folder and every Markdown file inside opens (subfolders included).
- Drag & drop, drop files or an entire folder onto the page.
- Paste, paste Markdown text directly; the tab is auto-named from the first heading.
Tip: limits for a snappy reader: up to 50 files, 5 MB per file, 50 MB per drop. Bigger sets are trimmed with a notice rather than freezing the tab.
Reading: tabs, outline, Mermaid read
Each file is a tab: click to switch, × to close, Clear all to reset. A Table-of-Contents outline is built from the document's headings (H1–H3); click any entry to jump to that section.
Fenced ```mermaid blocks render as diagrams inline, using the same vendored, locked-down Mermaid engine as the Mermaid Editor. Print renders the current document on a clean white background.
What a .md file is, and why your computer fights you
A .md file is plain text written in Markdown: headings marked with #, emphasis with asterisks, links in brackets. Because it is plain text, double-clicking one usually opens a bare text editor showing the raw symbols, or the operating system asks what app to use, which is why "how do I open this .md file?" is such a common question. The file was almost certainly meant to be read rendered, with real headings and working links.
You meet .md files everywhere software travels: every code project's README.md, documentation folders in repositories, and exports from note apps that use Markdown as their storage format. None of them need an install to read properly: open the file here and it renders formatted, in your browser, without the file going anywhere. If you need to hand the document to someone as a conventional file, convert it once with Markdown to PDF or Markdown to Word.
A worked example: reading a project's docs folder
Say you have just downloaded or cloned a project and its docs/ folder holds a dozen Markdown files. Drag the whole folder onto this page: each file opens as its own tab, named from the file, with subfolders included. The outline pane builds itself from each document's headings, so a long architecture page becomes a clickable table of contents instead of a wall of scrolling.
Files that embed ```mermaid diagrams, common in architecture docs, render as actual diagrams inline. When one page matters enough to keep, print it to paper or PDF from the reader on a clean white background. Close the tab and nothing lingers: the files were never uploaded, so there is nothing anywhere to delete.
Safe by default security
A reader opens files you may not have written, a .md someone emailed you, a download, a repo you cloned. Every file is rendered through iLoveMD's hardened pipeline: the Markdown is converted to HTML and then sanitized with DOMPurify (no <script>, no inline event handlers, no <iframe>/<object>/<svg> injection), with every link forced to rel="noopener noreferrer". Mermaid runs in securityLevel: 'strict'.
Nothing is uploaded and nothing is stored, close the tab and the documents are gone.