Markdown Formatter
Clean up Markdown with this Markdown Formatter. Paste a README, documentation page or notes and the tool trims leading and trailing blank lines and realigns every pipe table: cells are padded to the widest entry in their column and the separator row is rebuilt with matching dashes, keeping alignment colons. Everything else stays as written, so writers and developers get tidy tables without surprises.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Markdown Formatter change?
It realigns pipe tables and trims blank lines and spaces from the start and end of the document. Headings, paragraphs, lists, links and emphasis are left exactly as you wrote them.
How are tables formatted?
Every row gets a leading and trailing pipe, each cell is padded with spaces to the width of the widest cell in its column, and columns are at least three characters wide. The separator row is rebuilt with dashes to the same width.
Are column alignments kept?
Yes, colons in the separator row are preserved. Left, center and right alignment written as :---, :---: and ---: survive the reformatting.
Are tables inside code blocks changed?
No, anything between fences of three backticks or three tildes is left untouched. That includes text inside code blocks that looks like a table.
Why do columns with accented letters or emoji look misaligned?
Cell widths are measured in UTF-8 bytes, so characters outside ASCII count as two to four. Columns with such characters may get extra padding in a plain text editor, while the rendered table is unaffected.
Does it change list markers or heading styles?
No, list markers, numbering, heading markers and spacing inside paragraphs are kept as written. The formatter is deliberately conservative so it never changes how your document renders.
Does the formatted document render differently?
No, padding table cells and trimming the document's outer blank lines do not change the rendered output. GitHub, GitLab and other renderers show the same tables before and after.
Can I use it for MDX files?
Yes, but the MDX Formatter is the better fit, because it marks the result as mdx. Both apply the same rules and leave imports and JSX untouched.
Why is the result wrapped in a markdown code fence?
The output is returned inside a code block marked markdown, so it shows as source when pasted into a Markdown viewer. Copy the lines between the outer fences for your .md file.
How large can my document be?
Up to 5 MB per run; larger input is rejected with a message. The output is identical to the Markdown option of the Code Formatter.