There are two schools of thought for writing formatted content. The first says you should see what you're getting as you type, like a word processor. The second says you should write in plain text with lightweight syntax and let a renderer handle the output. Both approaches work. Neither is universally better.
Choosing between a markdown editor and a WYSIWYG editor comes down to who's writing, where the content lives, and what happens to it afterward.
What is a markdown editor?
A markdown editor lets you write in plain text using a simple syntax. You type ## Heading and the renderer turns it into an h2. You type **bold** and get bold text. The raw file is just a .md file — readable in any text editor, diffable with git, portable across every tool that handles markdown.
The two common layouts are a single pane (you write syntax, hit preview to see output) and a split pane (syntax on the left, rendered output on the right in real time). md0's live editor is a split-pane example.
The syntax isn't difficult. Most people pick it up in under an hour. But there is a learning curve, and that matters when you're thinking about who else will edit the content.
What is a WYSIWYG editor?
WYSIWYG ("What You See Is What You Get") editors show you formatted output as you type. You click a button to make text bold; you don't type asterisks. The experience is closer to Google Docs or Notion than to a code editor.
For non-technical users, this is a much lower barrier to entry. No syntax to learn, no mental translation between raw text and rendered output. The tradeoff is portability: the underlying storage format is often HTML, a proprietary format, or a structured JSON blob — none of which are as clean to version-control or move between systems as plain markdown.
Good WYSIWYG editors that output markdown exist, and they narrow the gap considerably. md0's WYSIWYG editor is one example — it gives you a word-processor interface that writes clean markdown underneath.
Side-by-side comparison
| Factor | Markdown editor | WYSIWYG editor | |---|---|---| | Learning curve | Moderate (syntax to learn) | Low (no syntax) | | Portability | High (plain text, any tool) | Varies (depends on output format) | | Version control | Excellent (diffs cleanly) | Poor to moderate | | Speed for technical writers | Fast once fluent | Slower for code-heavy content | | Speed for non-technical users | Slow at first | Fast immediately | | SSG integration | Native | Requires markdown output | | Collaboration with non-devs | Friction | Smooth |
When to use a markdown editor
Markdown editors are the right choice when:
Content lives in a git repo. Markdown files diff cleanly. You can review changes in a pull request, revert to previous versions, and branch without losing anything. WYSIWYG output stored as HTML or JSON is harder to review in a diff and doesn't merge cleanly.
You're writing technical documentation. Code blocks, inline code, and syntax highlighting are first-class in markdown. Most WYSIWYG editors treat code as an afterthought.
The content will feed a static site generator. Jekyll, Hugo, Astro, Next.js — they all consume markdown natively. If your content pipeline ends in an SSG, writing in markdown avoids a conversion step and potential formatting loss.
You're the sole writer or working with a technical team. Once you're fluent in markdown syntax, you're faster in a markdown editor than in any WYSIWYG tool. No mouse, no toolbar, no mode-switching.
When to use a WYSIWYG editor
WYSIWYG editors make more sense when:
Non-technical collaborators are editing content. Asking a marketing writer or a client to learn markdown syntax creates friction. If they need to update a page heading or fix a typo, a WYSIWYG interface removes that barrier entirely.
The content is primarily prose with minimal formatting. If you're writing long-form articles without much code or complex structure, the WYSIWYG experience is fine and the portability tradeoff matters less.
You need quick one-off documents. For something you'll paste into a CMS and never touch again, the overhead of markdown syntax isn't worth it.
You're onboarding a non-technical team to a content workflow. WYSIWYG editors give content teams autonomy without requiring them to understand the underlying format. That's a real operational advantage.
Can you have both?
Yes. The distinction between markdown editors and WYSIWYG editors is less sharp than it used to be. Several tools now offer a WYSIWYG interface that writes markdown to disk. You get the editing experience of a word processor and the storage format of a plain text file.
md0's WYSIWYG editor works this way. You type in a formatted interface, and the output is clean markdown you can copy directly into a file. The live editor gives you the opposite approach: a split pane where you write syntax on the left and watch it render on the right.
The md0 CMS goes further — it sits in front of a GitHub repository and lets non-technical editors write content through a WYSIWYG interface while the underlying storage is markdown files committed to git. Writers get the interface they're comfortable with; developers get content in the format they actually want.
If your team has a mix of technical and non-technical writers, a WYSIWYG-to-markdown tool is often the pragmatic answer rather than forcing one group to adopt the other's preferred workflow.
Try both approaches at md0.io — WYSIWYG editor and Live markdown editor. Free, no signup.