How to Turn Markdown into an Image (Without Screenshotting)
The problem with screenshotting
The usual way people share a piece of Markdown is to screenshot it. That works, but it carries everything around the text with it: the scrollbar, the sidebar, the send button, whatever theme the app happened to be in. The result reads as a picture of an app rather than a piece of content.
It also breaks at the wrong places. A screenshot is bounded by the viewport, not by the text, so a long answer becomes either an unreadably tall strip or three overlapping captures with a repeated line in the middle.
What "rendering" means instead
Rendering means the Markdown is parsed first, then laid out on a canvas at a fixed size:
- Headings get their own size and weight
- List items get markers and indentation, and nested items stay attached to their parent
- Blockquotes get set apart from the surrounding text
- Code blocks switch to a monospace face
- Text is measured against the card, so it breaks between cards at a sensible point
You end up with images that were designed at the target dimensions, rather than a crop of something that was designed for a browser window.
Doing it on TextCard
- Paste your Markdown into the box on the home page
- Pick the platform you are posting to — the card size changes with it
- Pick a background
- Download the whole set
Nothing is uploaded. The parsing, layout and image encoding all happen in your browser, which is also why there is no account and no export limit.
What gets kept and what does not
Kept: headings (three levels), paragraphs, ordered and unordered lists including nesting, blockquotes, fenced code blocks, horizontal rules.
Converted to plain text: bold, italic, inline code, links and strikethrough. A single
canvas text node cannot mix weights mid-line, so **bold** renders as clean text rather
than as a bold run. That is still a large improvement over the raw asterisks you get from
a plain paste.
Dropped: tables and images. Neither survives a card layout at these dimensions in a form worth reading.
When to use the manual editor instead
If you have one short piece of text — a quote, a single line, a cover — and you want control over the exact font, size and placement, the Text Card Editor is the better tool. The Markdown flow is for the case where you have a lot of structured text and want it laid out for you.
Frequently asked questions
Can I convert Markdown to an image without installing anything?
Yes. The studio on the home page parses and renders in your browser with Canvas, so there is nothing to install and nothing to sign up for. The text you paste never leaves your device.
What Markdown does the renderer support?
Headings at three levels, paragraphs, ordered and unordered lists including nesting, blockquotes, fenced code blocks and horizontal rules. Bold, italic, inline code, links and strikethrough are converted to plain text. Tables and images are dropped.
What resolution are the exported images?
Each card is drawn at the full pixel size of the ratio you pick — 1080x1350 for 4:5, 1080x1080 for 1:1, and so on — not scaled up from a preview.
What happens if my Markdown is longer than one card?
It is measured against the card and split into a set, breaking between blocks rather than mid-sentence. The strip under the preview shows how many cards you ended up with.