iA Writer
A minimalist, typography-obsessed markdown editor for focused writing
At a glance
Writers who want a clean, distraction-free markdown editor
Our take
iA Writer’s entire design philosophy is subtraction — a single focused typeface, a distraction-free ‘Focus Mode’ that dims everything but your current sentence, and a content-type detection feature that highlights nouns, adjectives, and verbs to sharpen your prose. We think it’s the best pure writing tool for people who find Word or Google Docs too cluttered and don’t need Ulysses’ project management layer. It’s a one-time purchase per platform rather than a subscription, which we appreciate, though that means separate payments if you write across Mac, iPad, and Windows.
Key features
- ✓Focus Mode dims everything but current sentence
- ✓Syntax highlighting for parts of speech
- ✓Markdown-native with live preview
- ✓One-time purchase per platform
- ✓iCloud and Working Copy sync
What we like
- ✓Beautifully minimal, distraction-free design
- ✓One-time purchase, no subscription
- ✓Strong markdown and export support
- ✓Available across Mac, Windows, and iOS
What could be better
- ✗Separate purchase required per platform
- ✗No built-in grammar checking
- ✗Lacks project/library organization of Ulysses
This page contains affiliate links. If you sign up through them, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. We only recommend tools we’d use ourselves.