The AI-native Markdown app

Markdown,
finally beautiful.

Your AI agents write Markdown all day. Ashlr MD turns those raw .md files into clean, readable documents you can open, edit, export, and actually understand — with free, private, on-device AI built in.

Download for macOS Star on GitHub →
Free & open source (MIT) Local-first No account, no telemetry
✦
On-device AIFree & private
⤓
Export PDF · DOCXOne click, offline
PLAN.md
ReadEditSource
✓ PLAN · 2/4

Launch Plan

Generated by Claude Code · 2 min read

💡
Note — this plan was generated by an AI agent. Review before shipping.
  • ✓Scaffold the project
  • ✓Build the renderer
  • Wire up export
  • Ship it
bashCopy
# install & open
brew install --cask md-opener
mdopen PLAN.md
Theme
Built for the agentic era · works beautifully with Claude Code · Codex · Cursor · and every tool that hands you a .md
The problem

macOS opens your Markdown wrong.

Double-click a .md and you get Preview (a blank page) or TextEdit (a wall of raw syntax). Neither is built for the documents AI agents actually produce.

Today · TextEdit
# Launch Plan > [!NOTE] > This plan was generated by an AI agent. - [x] Scaffold the project - [ ] Wire up export ```bash mdopen PLAN.md ```
With Ashlr MD

Launch Plan

💡
Note — generated by an AI agent.

✓ Scaffold the project

Wire up export

mdopen PLAN.md

Everything you need

A real app for your .md files.

Open, read, edit, and share Markdown — beautifully, instantly, and without leaving your Mac.

Instant, beautiful rendering

GitHub-flavored Markdown, syntax-highlighted code, Mermaid diagrams, math, tables, footnotes — rendered the moment you double-click.

Edit without the syntax

A Typora-style WYSIWYG editor for everyone, plus a lossless source mode for power users. Saves are instant and safe.

Export anywhere

One click to a polished PDF, a Word doc, or a self-contained HTML page. Fully offline. No Pandoc, no accounts.

Smart agent output

Callouts, interactive checkboxes that save back to the file, and automatic plan / diff / multi-file detection — agent docs come alive.

Three gorgeous themes

Paper, Sepia, and Midnight — switch live, and everything from code to diagrams follows along. Beautiful in light and dark.

Native & instant

Built on Tauri — a tiny native binary that launches in a blink. No Electron bloat, no spinning beachballs.

Free · private · on-device

AI that never leaves your Mac.

Summarize, explain, rewrite, or translate any document — powered by Apple's on-device foundation models. No API key. No subscription. Nothing uploaded.

  • ✓
    Genuinely free. On-device inference on Apple Silicon — zero cost, zero setup.
  • ✓
    Genuinely private. Your documents never touch a server. The green badge proves it.
  • ✓
    Smart fallback. No Apple Intelligence? It uses local Ollama, or your own key — your choice.
On device
AI AssistantApple Foundation Models
Summarize this plan in one line
A four-step launch plan — scaffolding and the renderer are done; export wiring and shipping remain.
Agent-native

Your agents can drive it.

Ashlr MD speaks the language of coding agents. Open a file from the terminal, a URL, or let Claude Code read and edit the live document over MCP.

  • ›
    mdopen file.md — open from any terminal or script.
  • ↗
    mdopener:// — deep-link straight to a document.
  • ⚙
    MCP server — agents open, read, edit & export the current doc.
# open a file in Ashlr MD from anywhere
$ mdopen PLAN.md

# let Claude Code drive the app
$ claude mcp add mdopener mdopener-mcp
✓ connected · 5 tools available

# now, inside Claude Code:
"open README.md, add a Summary
 section, and export it as PDF"
Make it yours

Three themes. Zero config.

Pick a mood and the whole document — text, code, diagrams, chrome — follows. Try them live in the preview above.

Paper
Paper clean light
Sepia
Sepia warm reading
Midnight
Midnight true dark
M

Open Markdown.
Instantly beautiful.

Free, open source, and local-first. Make Ashlr MD your default .md handler and never dread a Markdown file again.

Download for macOS View source →