Peekdown and Marked 2 are both native Mac apps that render Markdown, but they're built for different jobs. Marked 2 is a previewer you pair with a text editor. It re-renders your document every time you save. Peekdown is a viewer — the app that opens when you double-click a .md file or press Space in Finder. I make Peekdown, so keep that in mind.
What Marked 2 does that Peekdown doesn't
Quite a lot. Marked 2 runs custom pre- and post-processors (shell scripts that transform your text before it renders) so it can handle Markdown that needs processing first. It ships MultiMarkdown alongside GFM, understands CriticMarkup and Fountain, and previews compiled Scrivener documents live. It exports to HTML, PDF, and Word, including self-contained HTML with embedded assets. And it has real writer tooling: word counts, reading time, readability scores, link validation, and a searchable table of contents.
If your Markdown gets processed, compiled, or exported into other formats, buy Marked 2. It's $13.99, it's been at this since 2014, and nothing else on the Mac goes as deep.
One thing to know before you buy: the last Marked 2 update was v2.6.46 in March 2025, and new development has moved to Marked 3 (macOS 11+, $2.99 a month or $69.99 one-time at launch pricing). Marked 2 still works and still does everything above.
What Peekdown does that Marked 2 doesn't
Quick Look and the double-click. Marked 2 has no Finder integration. It's designed to sit next to your editor, not to open files. Peekdown is a viewer for .md and .mdx files with a Quick Look extension: press Space on a Markdown file in Finder and it renders GitHub-style instantly, no app launch.
Rendering matches GitHub exactly for pure Markdown, so you can proof a README before pushing it (GitHub-side extras like @mentions are out of scope). Obsidian syntax works in both the app and Quick Look: all 13 callout types, wikilinks, highlights, and tags, with YAML frontmatter hidden and %%comments%% stripped, so vault notes read like notes. Files reload automatically when something else writes to them, there's a side-by-side editor for quick fixes, and you can annotate rendered output (strike text, add comments) and export the markup to your AI. It's a 13MB download, uses about 70MB of RAM, and costs $3.99 one-time. It needs macOS 15.0 or later.
Side by side
| Peekdown | Marked 2 | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $3.99 | $13.99 |
| What it is | Default opener + Quick Look | Previewer beside your editor |
| Quick Look | Yes | No |
| Obsidian syntax | Yes | No |
| MDX | Yes | No |
| Annotations | Yes | No |
| Custom processors | No | Yes |
| PDF/Word export | No | Yes |
| Writing stats | No | Yes |
| Scrivener previews | No | Yes |
| Last release | Active (2026) | Mar 2025 (v2.6.46) |
| macOS minimum | 15.0 | 10.12, per their site |
"No" on the Obsidian row means I couldn't find it in Marked 2's own documentation — same standard as the full roundup.
Which one?
Get Marked 2 if your Markdown ends up as something else: PDFs, Word docs, compiled Scrivener projects. Get Peekdown if your Markdown stays Markdown and you just want it to open and look right. Or get both; they don't overlap much.