Markdown Buddy › Markdown Quick Look on Mac

Markdown Quick Look on Mac

macOS shows a .md file as raw text in Quick Look: hashes, asterisks, pipe tables. Markdown Buddy installs a Quick Look extension that renders the document instead, so a press of the Space bar gives you the formatted page, headings and code blocks included.

Turning it on

1. Install Markdown Buddy from the Mac App Store and launch it once. macOS only registers a Quick Look extension after the app that carries it has run.
2. Open System Settings, go to General then Login Items and Extensions, and check that Markdown Buddy is enabled under Quick Look.
3. Select any .md file in the Finder and press the Space bar. The rendered document appears instead of the raw text.

What the preview renders

The Quick Look panel uses the same renderer as the app, so nothing is downgraded:

• Headings, bold, italic, links, images and blockquotes
• Fenced code blocks with syntax highlighting
• Tables, task lists and strikethrough
• Mermaid diagrams and KaTeX formulas
• YAML front matter, shown as a panel rather than as stray text

Thumbnails in the Finder

The same package installs a thumbnail extension. Your .md files stop looking like blank sheets: Icon, Column and Gallery views show the beginning of the rendered document, which makes a folder of notes readable at a glance.

If the preview stays blank

• Launch Markdown Buddy once, then close it. An extension that has never run is not registered with macOS.
• Check that the extension is ticked in System Settings, under General, Login Items and Extensions, section Quick Look.
• Rebuild the Quick Look cache from the Terminal with qlmanage -r, then log out and back in. macOS caches extension registrations aggressively.
• Make sure the file really carries the .md extension. A file typed as plain text is handled by the system previewer, not by ours.