Markdown Table Generator

How to build a Markdown table

1. Type your headings across the top row of the grid and your data below.
2. Set each column's alignment from the dropdown in its heading.
3. Copy the Markdown underneath, or download it as a .md file.

How alignment is encoded

Markdown puts column alignment in the separator row, using colons:

| Left | Centre | Right |
| :--- | :----: | ----: |

A colon on the left aligns left, on the right aligns right, and on both sides centres. Getting those colons in the right places by hand is fiddly; the dropdowns write them for you.

Why line the columns up

Padding the cells so the pipes line up costs nothing at render time — the output is identical either way — but it makes an enormous difference to the raw file. A padded table is readable in a plain editor, and diffs stay meaningful because editing one cell does not reflow the rest of the row.

Turn padding off when you want the shortest possible output, or when a table is wide enough that alignment whitespace becomes more distracting than helpful.

Pipes inside a cell

A pipe character ends a cell, so a value containing one has to be escaped as \|. That happens automatically — otherwise a cell containing a value like a | b would split into two and shift the rest of the row.

Starting from something you already have

Paste an existing Markdown table into the import box and it becomes an editable grid, alignment included. Comma and tab separated text works too, so a range copied straight out of a spreadsheet imports directly.

Common use cases

• Adding a comparison or options table to a README.
• Documenting a configuration reference or an API's parameters.
• Reformatting a table someone sent you as a spreadsheet range.