I built a Markdown reader for Android because every one I tried sucked

Json — Tue, 24 Feb 2026 22:52:25 +0000

The problem nobody talks about

I use Markdown for everything. Notes in Obsidian, documentation, ChatGPT exports, random .md files people send me. On my laptop, life is good — VS Code, Typora, whatever. Files look great.

Then I try to open the same file on my Android phone.

And it's... bad. Every app I found falls into one of these categories:

Full editors — I don't want to edit a README on my phone. I want to READ it.
Ugly renderers — Monospace font, no syntax highlighting, looks like 2005.
"Create an account to continue" — No thanks.
The file manager approach — Opens as raw text. Cool, I love reading ## Heading with my eyes.

So I built MarkDeck

MarkDeck is a Markdown reader for Android. Emphasis on reader — it doesn't edit, it doesn't sync, it doesn't need an account. You open a .md file and it renders it nicely. That's the whole thing.

What it does:

• Opens from anywhere — tap a .md file in your file manager, email, browser downloads, whatever. MarkDeck handles it.
• Clean rendering — proper typography, not just "slightly formatted text"
• Syntax highlighting — code blocks actually look like code blocks
• Dark mode — because obviously
• Fast — it's a reader, not an IDE. It should open instantly.

What's next

I have a list of stuff I want to add:

• Table of contents for long documents
• Better table rendering
• Search within documents
• Custom themes

But first I need to make sure the basics are solid.

Try it?

I'm in Google Play closed testing right now. I need a few more testers before Google lets me publish publicly.

If you have an Android phone and read Markdown files, I'd genuinely appreciate you trying it:

👉 Join the beta

https://play.google.com/apps/testing/com.markdeck.markdeck

Check out the landing page: markdeck.dev

Tell me what breaks, what's confusing, what's missing. I'm a solo dev building this from Colombia, and real feedback from real people is the most valuable thing right now.

Thanks for reading this far. 🤙

DEV Community: Json

I built a Markdown reader for Android because every one I tried sucked