RC Markdown vs MDReader
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side โ with what reviewers say about each.
RC Markdown
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THE AI WORKFLOW COMPANION Claude, ChatGPT, and other AI assistants produce detailed reports. But when you open them on iPhone, LaTeX math breaks, Mermaid diagrams disappear, and code looks like a mess. RC Markdown handles all of it. A dedicated viewer built to read, render, and share AI-generated documents exactly as intended. DISTRACTION-FREE READING, BUILT FOR LONG DOCUMENTS No toolbars. No editing UI. Just your document, rendered beautifully, ready to read from start to finish. Open a file, read it comfortably, and forward it to your team. RENDERING Complex Math โ On-device KaTeX rendering for inline and block LaTeX equations. Technical Diagrams โ Mermaid support for flowcharts, sequence diagrams, Gantt charts, and more. Clean Code โ Syntax highlighting for 20+ languages including Python, Swift, Rust, and TypeScript. EXPORT AND SHARE Tap Export to convert your document and open the iOS Share Sheet instantly โ send via Mail, Messages, Slack, or save to Files. PDF โ Vector-based, text-selectable, always cleanly formatted. PNG โ Full-document image, ready to paste into any chat or deck. HTML โ Self-contained file with all styles and diagrams embedded. DESIGNED FOR iOS Table of Contents โ Auto-generated from headings. Tap to jump, drag the panel anywhere on screen. In-Document Search โ Real-time highlighting with match-by-match navigation. Dark Mode โ Light, Dark, or System. Optimized for OLED displays. Available in 10 languages โ English, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese, Korean, Simplified and Traditional Chinese. iPhone and iPad โ Optimized for both. PRIVATE AND OFFLINE No accounts. No sign-in. No internet required. Every feature works completely offline. No data ever leaves your device.
MDReader
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MDReader opens your Markdown files and folders and renders them properly. There is no library to import into, no account to create and no sync service in the middle. Your .md files stay exactly where you put them, and MDReader reads and writes them in place. FAST, EVEN ON BIG FILES A two-tier parser scans a document in a single pass and only fully parses the blocks you can actually see. A 10 MB file opens before other editors have finished showing a spinner, and scrolling stays smooth all the way down. RENDERS THE WHOLE OF MARKDOWN GitHub-flavoured Markdown with tables, task lists you can tick straight from reading mode, footnotes that jump both ways, YAML front matter shown as a card, LaTeX math inline and display, fenced code with syntax highlighting, and Mermaid diagrams rendered offline. AN EDITOR THAT STAYS OUT OF THE WAY Live syntax highlighting, lists that continue and renumber themselves, bold/italic/link shortcuts, find and replace, table and formula inserters, and paste an image to save it next to the document. Autosave goes through the system file coordinator, so editing alongside Obsidian, git or iCloud is safe. PICKS UP WHERE YOU LEFT OFF Reading position is restored to the pixel, per document, across relaunches, rotation and window resizes. FOLDER WORKSPACES (PRO) Open a whole folder: a repository's docs, an Obsidian vault, a Zettelkasten. Fuzzy quick-open, full-text search across every file in the folder, [[wiki-links]] with a backlinks panel, a front-matter tag browser, and read-only git status per file. Changes made by other apps are picked up in place, without losing your position. MORE IN PRO PDF export and print, publishing to GitHub Gist and Telegraph, presentation mode for slides, a custom theme editor with imported fonts, focus and typewriter modes, word-count goals, reading statistics, text-to-speech with follow-along highlighting, local version history with diffs, snippets, Vim keybindings, and an AI pack that summarises and rewrites entirely on device. BUILT FOR APPLE PLATFORMS One purchase covers iPhone, iPad and Mac. Keyboard shortcuts throughout, multiple windows, menu bar commands, a Share extension, Shortcuts actions, widgets, a URL scheme, Spotlight indexing, VoiceOver labels and Dynamic Type. PRIVACY MDReader collects nothing. No analytics SDK, no account, no server of ours to talk to. The only network traffic is what your own documents ask for, such as remote images, plus the publishing integrations you set up yourself. FREE AND PRO The reader and the single-file editor are free forever: all rendering including math and syntax highlighting, the base themes, table of contents, in-file search, HTML, Markdown and plain-text export, and position restore. Pro unlocks folder workspaces and the power features above, as a one-time purchase or as a yearly subscription with a free trial. SUBSCRIPTION AND PURCHASE DETAILS MDReader Pro (Yearly) - auto-renewable subscription, 1 year, USD 9.99 per year, including a 7-day free trial for new subscribers. MDReader Pro (Lifetime) - one-time purchase, USD 24.99, not a subscription. Payment is charged to your Apple Account at confirmation of purchase. A yearly subscription renews automatically unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24 hours before the end of the current period, and your account is charged for renewal within 24 hours before the period ends. You can manage or cancel the subscription in your Apple Account settings after purchase. Any unused portion of a free trial is forfeited when a subscription is purchased. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ App Terms of Service: https://gelfand.dev/mdreader/terms Privacy Policy: https://gelfand.dev/mdreader/privacy
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: RC Markdown at none against MDReader's 2. RC Markdown also leads on update cadence (daily vs every 2 weeks) and iOS requirement (17.0 vs 26.0). MDReader's advantage is ads (none vs shown). On price and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price ยท Rating ยท Positive reviews ยท Number of ratings ยท Update frequency ยท Ads ยท In-app purchases ยท Monetization ยท Best chart rank ยท Devices ยท Requires iOS
Both are free to download. MDReader sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $9.99 per year. RC Markdown asks for nothing beyond the download.
RC Markdown ships an update daily, MDReader every 2 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 9, 2026 and November 10, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | RC Markdown | MDReader |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Update frequency | Daily โ better | Every 2 weeks |
| Ads | Yes | No โ better |
| In-app purchases | No โ better | Yes |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad, Mac โ better |
| Requires iOS | 17.0 โ better | 26.0 |
| Further details โ not scored | ||
| Size | 8 MB | 22 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Jaehong Lim | Daniil Nuzhdin |
In-app purchases
RC Markdown
No in-app purchases
MDReader
- MDReader Pro Yearly7 Days trial$9.991 Year
- MDReader Pro$24.99








