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A fast, lightweight Markdown and TXT editor for Windows—just like Notepad.
- Markdown Without Memorizing Syntax: Write directly in a Word-like formatted view while your files are saved as standard Markdown.
- Lightweight Like Notepad, Fast with Large Files: Around 1.3 MB installer. Opens documents with millions of characters right away with no typing lag.
- MD and TXT in One App: Edit TXT files like Notepad with line numbers, and MD files like formatted documents. Open and save in multiple encodings.
- Reliable Korean, Japanese, and Chinese Input: Characters don't break and the cursor doesn't jump when typing Korean, Japanese, or Chinese.
- Keep Your Work Safe: Recovers unsaved text on the next launch after an unexpected exit, and protects the original file from corruption even if an error occurs while saving.
- Free and Open Source: Released under the GPL v3 license for anyone to use and modify.
Download Latest Release (Releases)
- Installer (
MDNote-Setup-<version>.exe): Choose your language on the first screen of the setup. - Portable version, no installation required (
MDNote-<version>-portable.zip): Extract the ZIP and runMDNote.exe. - Requires Windows 10/11 64-bit and .NET Framework 4.8 (pre-installed on Windows).
- Because the executable is not digitally signed, Windows may show a warning on first launch. Click More info → Run anyway.
- Edit as formatted: Symbols like
#and**stay hidden while you write. Switch to Live mode or Source when you want to see them. - Toolbar and table editing: Insert headings, bold, text color, lists, code, links, images and tables with a click; type straight into table cells.
- GitHub formatting and math: Alerts (GitHub and Obsidian style), highlights, footnotes,
[TOC], emoji and math ($E=mc^2$) are rendered right in the editor. - TXT mode: Plain text with line numbers, just like Notepad.
- Tabs, windows and outline: Open documents in tabs or windows, and jump through the heading list or the files in the same folder.
- Tidy images: Pasted or dropped images are collected into a folder next to the document when you save.
- Find & replace, print, save as HTML, many encodings (UTF-8, CP949, Shift JIS, GBK, Big5, etc.)
- Continue previous session, file change alerts
- Dark, focus and typewriter modes, custom shortcuts, 5 languages
 Live mode: Shows Markdown symbols only on the line where the cursor is, while the rest stays formatted. |
 Table Editing: Type directly inside cells, and add or align rows and columns using the toolbar. |
 Outline: Click a heading in the list to jump straight to that section. |
 Find & Replace: Find text in the document and replace it all at once. |
 TXT mode: Write plain text with line numbers, just like Notepad. |
 5 Languages: Menus, help guides, and sample documents switch to the selected language. |
 Alerts and formatting: GitHub alerts, Obsidian-style callouts with custom titles, highlights, footnotes and keyboard labels. |
 Math: Inline $…$ and display $$…$$ are drawn as formulas. |
Two guides are available under the Help menu in the app:
- Writing Markdown: How to write headings, lists, tables, images, and code, with examples
- Using MDNote: Full guide to menus, shortcuts, and view settings
- Windows only (Windows 10/11 64-bit).
- Flowcharts (Mermaid) are not rendered as graphics and are shown as plain text.
- To save as a PDF, select 'Microsoft Print to PDF' in the Print menu.
Can I open saved files in other programs? Yes. Files are saved as standard Markdown (.md) or plain text (.txt), so they open as-is in other editors. However, formatting not in standard Markdown, such as text color, is saved as HTML tags.
I want to see the Markdown symbols while writing. Turn on View → Markdown Live Preview to see symbols only on the line where the cursor is. To view the entire document with symbols, click the Source button at the top right.
If I keep typing right after bold text, does it stay bold? Yes. Typing right after the end of bold text keeps it bold, just as the Bold button shows. After a space, you type normal text.
Windows shows a warning when I run it for the first time. This is because the executable is not digitally signed. Click More info → Run anyway.
Can I use it without installing?
Yes. Download the file ending in -portable.zip from the latest release, extract it, and run MDNote.exe.
How do I uninstall it? For the installed version, uninstall it from the Apps list in Windows Settings. If you manually placed any files in the installation folder, only those files will remain. For the portable version, simply delete the extracted folder.
- By default, MDNote does not connect to the internet. It checks the latest version number on GitHub only when you select Help → Check for updates, or each time MDNote starts if you turn on Check for updates automatically (off by default). It never sends usage logs or document contents anywhere.
- To recover unsaved text, a copy of the content being edited is kept only in your PC's user folder (AppData). It is deleted when you save or close the document.
- Settings (font, language, shortcuts, etc.) are also saved only on your PC.
Please leave them on Issues. Including the following details will help us fix the issue faster:
- What you did (menus or keys pressed, characters typed), what happened, and what was supposed to happen
- Your Windows version and IME (Korean, Japanese, Chinese, etc.)
- A screenshot if possible. Please do not include private document contents.
Builds with the .NET Framework 4.8 C# compiler included in Windows. Visual Studio is not required.
.\src\build.ps1MDNote.exe will be created in the src folder.
The installer is built with NSIS 3. See src/installer/README.md for instructions.
MDNote is distributed under the GNU General Public License v3.0. Includes a modified version of AvalonEdit (MIT License). See THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.txt for details.
Copyright (c) 2026 Lahai-Roi