Comparison

MarkWrite vs PureOpen

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

MarkWrite

Features
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WYSIWYG Markdown editor that allows embedding pictures and natural language mathematics. MarkWrite is a fast, focused Markdown editor for Mac, iPad and iPhone. Your writing formats itself as you type — headings, bold, lists, quotes, tables and code appear the moment you write them, while the Markdown syntax stays visible only on the line you are editing. Nothing to toggle, no split screen required. EMBED IMAGES, NOT LINKS Drag a picture into your document and it is really there. Grab its corner to resize it and MarkWrite writes the new size back into the Markdown for you. Text and images are saved together in one self-contained document you can move, rename, duplicate or send without leaving a single broken link behind. Images can be embedded in any of the common formats: VS Code, Pandoc or HTML. WRITE EQUATIONS BY DESCRIBING THEM Say what you mean: "x equals minus b, plus or minus the square root of b squared minus four a c, all over two a." MarkWrite turns that sentence into a properly typeset formula. There is no LaTeX to memorise — though you can type LaTeX directly whenever you would rather. Powered by on-device Apple Intelligence; requires a supported device. ALSO • Tables that line up in the editor, not only in the preview • Live preview that follows your cursor, side by side or full width • Themes: fonts, colours, spacing, line height, list spacing — saved as presets • Callouts, footnotes, highlights, code blocks and inline code • Export to PDF or print, with your theme applied • Open a whole folder in tabs and work across files • Find and replace, including regular expressions STILL JUST MARKDOWN MarkWrite writes ordinary .md files. Nothing is trapped in a proprietary format, nothing is locked in a cloud, and nothing you have written is ever held behind a subscription. Open your work in any other editor, any time, or share it with anyone and they will be able to open it with any Markdown viewer, including the embedded images. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

PureOpen

Features
Read full description

PureOpen is a Markdown editor for Mac and iPhone built for right-to-left writing. Most editors treat RTL as a switch: turn it on and the whole document flips, which breaks the moment you write Hebrew or Arabic with English words in it. PureOpen decides direction per block instead. Every paragraph, heading and list item takes its direction from the first strong character in it — so a mixed document displays correctly with no setting, and with no direction marks written into your file. Files open in tabs, the way a browser opens pages, and your changes are on disk 600ms after you stop typing. RIGHT-TO-LEFT, PER BLOCK • RTL and LTR live side by side in one file. A Hebrew paragraph aligns right, the English paragraph under it aligns left, and each stays that way as you edit. • A Hebrew or Arabic sentence with English terms, code spans and links inside it reads correctly — the block stays RTL and the Latin runs sit where they belong. • A block with no strong character inherits the direction of the block above it, so blank lines and numbers don't break the flow. • Nothing is added to your Markdown to make this work: no RTL marks, no wrapper tags. The file stays portable. OPEN IT FROM THE FILE, NOT FROM THE APP • Right-click a Markdown file in Finder — or long-press it in Files on iPhone and iPad — and PureOpen sits at the top of "Open With". One click and the document is open in a tab in the window you already have. • No launching the app first, no file picker, no importing into a library. Double-click works the same way, and so does dragging a file onto the window. • Registered as the owner and editor of .md, .markdown, .mdown and .mkd. TABS • Every file opens in its own tab. ⌘1ā€“āŒ˜9 jump by position, Ctrl+Tab cycles, middle-click closes, and ⌘W closes the tab rather than the window. • The tabs you had open come back the next time you launch. SAVING • Autosave writes 600ms after you stop typing, and again on tab switch, tab close and window blur. A grey dot marks a tab with unsaved content. • If the file changes on disk — another editor, a sync client — it is reloaded quietly and your scroll position is kept. If it is deleted, editing locks so stale content is not written back over it. • Opening a file doesn't reformat it: an edit that didn't actually change the content doesn't trigger a write. EDITING • 17 formatting buttons: headings 1–4, bold, italic, underline, strikethrough, bullet, numbered and task lists, subscript, superscript, quote, inline code, code block and horizontal rule. • Each button reflects the block and the marks under the cursor, and updates as the cursor moves. • Underline, subscript and superscript are kept as HTML rather than dropped when the file is saved. PRINTING AND PDF • Print what you see. The page is the document as the editor renders it — headings, tables, task lists, code blocks, Hebrew and English side by side — without the tabs and the toolbar around them. • Export the same page straight to a PDF file, without going through the print dialog to find "Save as PDF". • Nothing is rendered a second time for paper, so what prints is what you were looking at. Pages break between lines, and the page is always light even when the app is in dark mode. ALSO • On iPhone and iPad, files opened from Files are edited in place — not copied into the app. • Dark mode follows the system setting. • Files past roughly 4 million characters open read-only as raw text, so the interface doesn't stall. • No network, no account, no telemetry. Your files stay on your device. PureOpen is free, with no in-app purchases.

Screenshots

MarkWrite3 screens
PureOpen4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: PureOpen at none against MarkWrite's 1. PureOpen also leads on update cadence (every 9 days vs every 4 weeks) and iOS requirement (15.0 vs 26.4). On price, ads and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price Ā· Rating Ā· Positive reviews Ā· Number of ratings Ā· Update frequency Ā· Ads Ā· In-app purchases Ā· Monetization Ā· Best chart rank Ā· Devices Ā· Requires iOS

CostPrice Ā· In-app purchases Ā· Ads Ā· Monetization

Both are free to download. MarkWrite sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $9.99 per year. PureOpen asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

MarkWrite ships an update every 4 weeks, PureOpen every 9 days. The most recent releases landed on October 3, 2026 and October 10, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard3 real differences Ā· 3 level
MarkWrite versus PureOpen: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterMarkWritePureOpen
PriceFreeFree
Update frequencyEvery 4 weeksEvery 9 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, MaciPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac — better
Requires iOS26.415.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size16 MB5 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperGuy ShavivYechiel Ben David

In-app purchases

1 purchases

MarkWrite

Subscriptions1
  • MarkWrite Pro$9.991 Year
None

PureOpen

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is MarkWrite free?
MarkWrite is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is PureOpen free?
PureOpen is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do MarkWrite or PureOpen have ads?
Neither MarkWrite nor PureOpen shows ads.
Which is updated more often, MarkWrite or PureOpen?
MarkWrite ships an update every 4 weeks, and PureOpen every 9 days. Most recently, MarkWrite was updated on October 3, 2026 and PureOpen on October 10, 2026.

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