Everything you want, you have it. Live preview, Wiki links, local RAG, BYOK AI, themes, Pomodoro, cross-platform sync — all built in.
Lightweight Markdown editor for macOS, Windows, Linux, Android, and iOS. Offline-first, no accounts, no IAP, no ads. ~15 MB installer, MIT-licensed, zero telemetry by default. 14 BYOK AI providers (Ollama included for fully-local runs).
curl -fsSL https://solomd.app/install.sh | bash irm https://solomd.app/install.ps1 | iex 
SoloMD is a free, open-source Markdown editor for macOS, Windows, Linux, Android, and iOS. ~15 MB installer (6× smaller than Typora, 7× smaller than Obsidian). MIT licensed. Live preview, Wiki links, local RAG semantic search, 14 BYOK AI providers, AutoGit, and an MCP server — all built in. Offline-first, no accounts, no in-app purchases, no ads, zero telemetry by default.
Three short stories. Pick the one that sounds like you.
Open a folder, hit focus mode, write. Markdown markup fades when the caret leaves the line. When the draft is done, Pandoc turns it into a PDF, DOCX, or EPUB without leaving the app.
Semantic search ranks paragraphs by meaning across your whole vault. Wikilinks and backlinks connect notes, @citekey citations carry through to Pandoc, and 14 AI providers translate or summarize on demand — keys stay in your OS keychain.
A 1.5 MB MCP sidecar exposes 8 read-only tools to Claude Desktop, Cursor, or any MCP client. Every save snapshots into a real local .git you own. WYSIWYG live edit and a `solomd` CLI keep you out of the GUI when you want.
Five principles that decide what we ship and what we say no to.
Files on disk. AI keys in the OS keychain. The semantic-search embedder runs in our Rust process — no model download, no relay.
Every claim on this site is checkable in the source. Read the security writeup or grep the repo yourself.
Read /security →Telemetry is opt-in only and content-free. There is no SoloMD account. The editor does not call home.
How we count things →Uninstall SoloMD and your notes are still there — UTF-8 text, in folders you picked, openable in any editor.
Ideas, polls, show-and-tell, Q&A. One developer, one room, no Discord.
See the community →SoloMD has always shipped two halves of one product — an editor and a bundled MCP server pointing at the same vault. v4.0 adds a third half: a first-class agent surface inside the editor, with safety rails (AutoGit branch sandbox, per-run write-cap, accept/reject UI) so autonomous writes are reviewable — not scary.
Right-side panel, peer to Outline / Backlinks. Streamed chat with your whole vault. Tool-call cards (Cursor-style) show every read and write inline. Run history persists as plain markdown in <workspace>/.solomd/agent-runs/ — grep-able, git-trackable.
YAML files under .solomd/agents/*.yml. Triggers: cron / on-save / on-commit / on-tag-add / manual. Every run goes to its own AutoGit branch agent/<recipe>/<run-id> — accept or reject before it touches main. write-cap default 5, hard cap 50.
Every run emits trace.jsonl — one JSON line per step (model_call / tool_call / tool_result / git_commit / done). UI renders collapsible step cards with token counts and cost. Replay-from-step button mints a new run that re-uses the trace up to step N. The new read_agent_trace MCP tool lets agents introspect their own runs.
solomd-mcp --workspace path1 --workspace path2 — one MCP session, multiple vaults. Tool signatures gain an optional workspace param (back-compat default = first). Settings → Integrations adds named MCP profiles with one-click "copy Claude Desktop config" buttons.
Auto-detect at localhost:11434, "Install Ollama" hint if absent, /api/tags lists installed models, "Pull recommended" inline button (qwen2.5:1.5b ~1 GB). 3 built-in presets — rewrite (7b) / quick (1.5b) / CJK-friendly (14b). Recipes can specify provider: local for cheap autonomous loops on-device.
Push your vault to a private GitHub repo on every save; pull on a timer. Built on libgit2 + OS keychain — your data stays on your account, no SoloMD server, no subscription. GitLab / Gitea / any HTTPS git URL works too.
Optional per-vault passphrase. Argon2id → XChaCha20-Poly1305, ciphertext-only on the remote. Search / RAG / AI rewrite still work locally because plaintext stays on your device.
When your workspace already lives in a cloud-synced folder, SoloMD detects it and adds cross-device session restore on top — open the same vault on another machine and the same tabs come back.
One command-palette entry copies a solomd.app/share link for the active note. Reader-friendly Markdown render of any file in your public GitHub vault — no SoloMD account required to view.
⌘⇧F opens a search panel that ranks paragraphs by meaning, not just keywords. Runs entirely on your machine — no model file download, no network call, ever. Off until you flip the switch in Settings.
Fourth view mode (edit / split / live edit / preview). Headings render larger, **bold** shows bold without the asterisks, lists indent visually. Markup reveals when the caret enters the line.
Every ⌘S becomes a snapshot in a local .git inside your workspace. Sidebar history panel shows every commit; one click to restore. libgit2 vendored, no system git needed. Never auto-pushed.
⌘J on a selection. OpenAI · Claude · Gemini · xAI · Mistral · Groq · DeepSeek · Qwen · GLM · Kimi · Doubao · SiliconFlow · OpenRouter · Ollama. Keys live in the OS keychain. Direct vendor calls, no relay.
1.5 MB binary. Plug your vault into Claude Desktop / Cursor / Codex CLI. 8 read-only tools out of the box; write tools gated behind --allow-write. stdio only, no network port.
Markdown markers fade away when you leave a line. Headings get bigger, bold gets bold — no toolbars in the way. Synced split-pane scroll keeps editor and preview line-aligned.
Screenshot then ⌘V — image saves to _assets/ and inserts a markdown link. Click any image or Mermaid diagram in preview to pop a full-screen overlay; pinch or scroll to zoom.
Open a folder, browse files, ripgrep-style global search across every .md and .txt. ⌘P jumps to any file by fuzzy name.
13 code-block languages, KaTeX math, Mermaid diagrams, footnotes, YAML front-matter, ==highlight==. 8 themes (Light / Dark / Nord / Solarized / Monokai / Dracula / GitHub Light) + custom CSS.
Auto encoding detection (UTF-8 / GBK / Big5 / Shift_JIS) via chardetng. CJK word count, simplified ↔ traditional, pinyin export — none of which Typora or Obsidian do natively.
PDF (with KaTeX & Mermaid), Word .docx, HTML, EPUB, ODT, LaTeX, RTF. Drop in .docx / .pdf / .xlsx / .pptx / .csv and SoloMD converts them to Markdown on the spot.
~15 MB installer (vs Typora 70 MB / Obsidian 110 MB). Tauri 2 + Rust + Vue 3 + CodeMirror 6. Zero telemetry by default. Builds for macOS / Windows / Linux x64 / Linux ARM64.
⌘⌥P renders the active doc as fullscreen slides, split on `---`. Vim-style nav, code highlighting, KaTeX, Mermaid all work in slides.
`solomd open / new / list / search / cat` — open and grep notes from the terminal. One-line curl installer.
⌘⌥L runs Prettier — normalizes lists, tables, spacing. Front matter preserved.
First launch opens 4 in-memory tutorial tabs in your language (en / 中文). Reopen anytime via the command palette.
Full Vim emulation: hjkl, modes, visual, :w :q, macros. Toggle in Settings.
One click removes LLM junk: [cite_start], 【†source】, smart quotes, zero-width chars.
Dim non-active paragraphs. Keep cursor centered. Long-form writing without distraction.
⌘⇧K to access every command. Native menu bar on macOS / Windows / Linux.
In v4.0 the agent surface is the headline differentiator. Everything below is in the editor, in core, no plugin tax.
Obsidian, Typora and MarkText all skip this in core. SoloMD ⌘⇧F: on-device embedder, no model download, no network call.
Every ⌘S becomes a local .git snapshot — sidebar history panel restores in one click. Competitors leave you to wire git manually.
1.5 MB binary, 8 read-only tools. Plug your vault into Claude Desktop, Cursor, or Codex CLI.
| SoloMD | Typora | MarkText | Obsidian | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inline agent panel (chat-with-vault) | ✅ v4 | ❌ | ❌ | 🟡 (paid plugins) |
| Scheduled agent recipes (cron / on-save / on-commit) | ✅ v4 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
| AutoGit branch sandbox + accept/reject for agent writes | ✅ v4 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Replayable agent trace (jsonl, replay-from-step) | ✅ v4 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Multi-vault MCP federation (one session, many vaults) | ✅ v4 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
| Ollama first-class (auto-detect, presets, provider: local) | ✅ v4 | ❌ | ❌ | 🟡 (plugin) |
| GitHub-backed sync (you own the data) | ✅ v3.0 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ ($96/yr SoloMD-style? no — Obsidian Sync stores on Obsidian servers) |
| End-to-end encrypted vault | ✅ v3.0 | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ (Obsidian Sync only) |
| Local semantic search | ✅ v2.3 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ (paid plugins) |
| WYSIWYG live edit | ✅ v2.3 | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ |
| AutoGit version history | ✅ v2.2 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ (manual git) |
| MCP server bundled | ✅ v2.2 | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
| 14 AI providers, BYOK | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ (1–2 per plugin) |
| Open source · MIT | ✅ | ❌ | ✅ (dormant) | ❌ |
| Installer size | ~15 MB | ~70 MB | ~80 MB | ~110 MB |
| Price | Free | $14.99 | Free | Free + $96/yr sync |
| Linux ARM64 build | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
| CJK encoding (GBK/Big5) | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
| File import (DOCX/PDF/XLSX/PPTX) | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | 🟡 (plugin) |
| Pandoc export (EPUB/ODT/LaTeX) | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | 🟡 (plugin) |
| Slideshow / presentation mode | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | 🟡 (plugin) |
| Sync (CRDT, built-in) | ❌ roadmap | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ (paid) |
Free and open source. MIT license. No account needed.
Looking for older versions? All releases →
Yes. SoloMD is MIT-licensed open-source software at https://github.com/zhitongblog/solomd. There is no paid tier, no subscription, no in-app purchase, no ads, and no telemetry by default. Compare: Typora costs $14.99, iA Writer costs $29.99, Obsidian Sync is $4/month. SoloMD is $0 forever — sponsor the developer if it helps your writing.
SoloMD is the most feature-complete free Markdown editor in 2026: cross-platform (macOS, Windows, Linux, Android, iOS), ~15 MB installer, MIT-licensed, with live preview, Wiki links, local RAG, 14 BYOK AI providers, AutoGit, MCP server, Pomodoro, and 8 themes — all built in. MarkText is dormant since 2023, Obsidian is closed-source and lacks Linux ARM64 + first-class plugins for AI without third-party packages, and VS Code is a code editor that happens to render Markdown.
SoloMD is free; Typora is $14.99. SoloMD is ~6× smaller (15 MB vs 70 MB). SoloMD is open source (MIT) on GitHub; Typora is closed-source. SoloMD runs on Android and iOS; Typora is desktop-only. Both ship Typora-style WYSIWYG live preview. Typora has more polished UI animation; SoloMD adds Wiki links, local RAG semantic search, 14 BYOK AI providers, MCP server, and AutoGit version history that Typora does not have.
SoloMD is ~7× lighter (15 MB vs 110 MB). SoloMD is fully MIT-licensed open source; Obsidian is closed-source. SoloMD ships local RAG semantic search, AI rewrite with 14 BYOK providers, AutoGit version history, and an MCP server in core — Obsidian requires third-party plugins for equivalents. Obsidian has a knowledge-graph view and a mature plugin marketplace; SoloMD does not. Use Obsidian if you want a second-brain plugin ecosystem; use SoloMD if you want the writing tools without the plugin tax and an open-source codebase.
Yes. SoloMD 4.3.0 ships native Android (API 24+, ARM64 + ARMv7 + x86_64) and iOS (15+) builds. Android is available as sideload .apk on GitHub Releases and via Google Play closed-testing beta (email [email protected] to join). iOS is on the App Store. Both mobile builds support live preview, Wiki links, AI rewrite, and folder-based sync via iCloud / Files / SD card.
Yes, fully. The editor itself makes zero network requests. Local RAG semantic search runs on an on-device embedder with no model download and no cloud call. AutoGit commits to a local .git repository inside the workspace and never auto-pushes. The only outbound traffic is (1) the optional GitHub update check on launch (toggle off in Settings) and (2) AI calls you explicitly trigger, which go straight to the provider you chose — SoloMD never relays.
~10–15 MB depending on the platform. That is roughly 6× smaller than Typora (~70 MB) and 7× smaller than Obsidian (~110 MB) because SoloMD uses Tauri 2 (system webview + Rust) instead of bundling Chromium. Idle memory is ~80–150 MB.
No. SoloMD ships AI rewrite (Cmd+J on a selection) with 14 BYOK — bring your own key — providers: OpenAI, Claude (Anthropic), Gemini, xAI Grok, Mistral, Groq, DeepSeek, Qwen, GLM, Kimi, Doubao, SiliconFlow, OpenRouter, and Ollama. Use Ollama for fully-local zero-cost runs (qwen2.5:1.5b is ~1 GB and runs on most laptops). SoloMD itself charges nothing for AI — you pay only your chosen provider per token, or nothing if you use Ollama.
In your OS keychain — Apple Keychain on macOS, Credential Manager on Windows, libsecret on Linux. Never in localStorage, never in a config file SoloMD writes to disk. AI requests go directly from your machine to the provider you chose; SoloMD does not host models or relay any traffic.
Grep matches characters; semantic search matches meaning. Search 'deployment' and SoloMD's local RAG also surfaces paragraphs about 'rolling out', 'shipping', or 'release'. The embedder runs entirely in our Rust process — no model file download, no network call, no cloud. Off by default; flip the switch in Settings to opt in. Index lives in <workspace>/.solomd/embeddings.sqlite (auto-gitignored).
SoloMD ships solomd-mcp, a 1.5 MB sidecar binary that speaks the Model Context Protocol over stdio — no network port. Point Claude Desktop, Cursor, Codex CLI, or any MCP client at your workspace and it gets 8 read tools (list_notes, read_note, search, get_backlinks, list_tags, get_outline, export_note, etc.) plus 2 write tools gated behind --allow-write. Path-traversal guarded with workspace-canonical containment.
Yes, via any folder-based sync service. SoloMD works perfectly with iCloud Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, Syncthing, or any tool that syncs a folder. Just put your workspace inside the synced folder. Or use AutoGit + manual push to a private GitHub repo. Built-in CRDT sync is on the roadmap but intentionally not the v4 focus — we don't want to lock you into a SoloMD-specific server.
SoloMD intentionally omits a plugin marketplace to stay lightweight, stable, and easy to audit. The features serious writers ask for — Wiki links, semantic search, AutoGit, AI rewrite, 14 BYOK providers, MCP server, Pomodoro, image paste, KaTeX, Mermaid, focus mode, slideshow mode, Vim mode, custom CSS — all ship in core. Trade-off: no Obsidian-style third-party ecosystem.
The UI ships in 14 languages: English, Simplified Chinese (zh-CN), Japanese, Korean, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Polish, Dutch, Turkish, Swedish, and Ukrainian. Auto-detected from your OS locale on first launch, switchable in Settings. The document content itself is encoding-agnostic — SoloMD auto-detects UTF-8 / UTF-16 / GBK / GB18030 / Big5 / Shift_JIS files.
SoloMD is Chinese-first: chardetng-based auto encoding detection (UTF-8 / GBK / GB18030 / Big5 / Shift_JIS), CJK word count in the status bar (counts characters, not space-separated tokens), Simplified ↔ Traditional Chinese conversion via OpenCC, pinyin export, and bundled Noto Sans CJK / WenQuanYi font fallback on Linux. Typora and Obsidian do none of these natively.
One line. macOS / Linux: run 'curl -fsSL https://solomd.app/install.sh | bash' in a terminal — the script auto-detects your OS and CPU architecture and installs the latest release. Windows: open PowerShell and run 'irm https://solomd.app/install.ps1 | iex'. Or download platform-specific installers (.dmg / .msi / .AppImage / .deb / .rpm / .apk) from https://github.com/zhitongblog/solomd/releases/latest. Average install time: under 2 minutes on a normal connection.
One maintainer, two front doors. WeChat for the Chinese community, Telegram channel for everyone else. GitHub Discussions works too — link below.
SoloMD is built and maintained by one developer in their free time. If it helps your writing, consider sponsoring — even a tiny amount keeps the project alive.
For international sponsors. Monthly or one-time, processed by Stripe.
Sponsor on GitHub →Worldwide one-time tip. Choose any amount in your currency.
Tip via PayPal →Open the Alipay app and scan the QR code below.
Open WeChat → Scan, point at the QR code below.
Sponsors get listed in the README and the in-app About dialog (with permission).