Parsedown

Parsedown is one class in one file. It parses Markdown line by line and produces HTML quickly. Its syntax is close to GitHub’s: fenced code blocks, tables, strikethrough, autolinks and soft line breaks. It isn’t CommonMark-compliant, so edge cases (nested lists, emphasis rules, HTML blocks) differ from other renderers, and there’s no AST. ParsedownExtra (separate package) adds Markdown Extra features: footnotes, definition lists, abbreviations, special attributes and Markdown inside HTML.

After years of 1.8 betas, Parsedown 1.8.0 was released in 2026; a 2.0 rewrite is in beta. Safe mode is off by default.

Installation#

composer require erusev/parsedown
# optional
composer require erusev/parsedown-extra

Basic usage: convert Markdown to HTML#

<?php
require 'vendor/autoload.php';

$parsedown = new Parsedown();
$markdown = file_get_contents('README.md');
echo $parsedown->text($markdown);

line() parses a single line of inline Markdown without wrapping it in <p>:

echo $parsedown->line('Hello _Parsedown_!');   // Hello <em>Parsedown</em>!

How to render user input safely#

$parsedown = new Parsedown();
$parsedown->setSafeMode(true);   // escapes raw HTML and blocks javascript: and similar links
echo $parsedown->text($userInput);

Safe mode was added in 1.7; for full protection also run the output through an HTML sanitizer such as HTML Purifier.

How to turn newlines into line breaks#

$parsedown->setBreaksEnabled(true);   // single newlines become <br />

How to disable automatic links#

$parsedown->setUrlsLinked(false);     // don't turn bare URLs into links

How to use footnotes and definition lists (ParsedownExtra)#

$extra = new ParsedownExtra();
echo $extra->text("Text with a note.[^1]\n\n[^1]: The note.\n\nTerm\n: Definition\n");

Tips#

• Parsedown keeps no state between calls, so one instance can render many documents.
• For CommonMark or full GFM compliance, or to work with the syntax tree, use league/commonmark.
• setMarkupEscaped(true) escapes HTML without the URL checks of safe mode.