Tinta is a fast, lightweight Markdown and Mermaid viewer for Windows, built with Direct2D and DirectWrite for hardware-accelerated rendering. A single native executable of under 5 MB that opens instantly — no Electron, no web engine, no installer.
Install
The recommended way is the Microsoft Store: the build is signed by the Store, trusted by Windows out of the box (no security prompts, works with Smart App Control), and updates automatically. The same signed build installs from the command line:
winget install "Tinta Markdown Viewer" -s msstore
Portable and other options
Prefer a single file? Grab the latest release: a portable tinta.exe, no installation required. Because a freshly released exe is not yet code-signed, Windows may show a SmartScreen prompt on first run ("More info", then "Run anyway") until the new version builds up download reputation.
Scoop users can install from the bucket:
scoop bucket add tinta https://github.com/oipoistar/scoop-bucket
scoop install tinta
Why Tinta?
Most markdown apps ship an entire browser to render text. Tinta uses the GPU-accelerated text stack already built into Windows:
| Tinta | Typora | Obsidian | VS Code |
|---|
| Startup | <100 ms | ~1.5 s | ~3 s | ~2 s |
| Install size | <5 MB | ~90 MB | ~250 MB | ~350 MB |
| Runtime | Native Direct2D | Electron | Electron | Electron |
It's a viewer first: perfect as the double-click default for .md and .mmd files, for reading documentation and diagrams — with an edit mode when you need it.
Features
- Lightning-fast startup - Direct2D rendering, no web engine overhead
- 10 beautiful themes - 5 light and 5 dark themes to choose from
- Hardware-accelerated - Smooth text rendering via DirectWrite
- Word wrap - Optional soft wrap in the editor (Ctrl+W)
- Native LaTeX math -
$inline$ and $$display$$ equations with matrices, cases, aligned equations, fractions, limits, accents and custom macros. Uses an installed math font; no bundled fonts or web engine. See the supported math syntax.
- Focused editing - Hide the preview pane while writing (Ctrl+E)
- Native Mermaid diagrams - 22 diagram families, from flowcharts with subgraphs through sequence, class, state, ER, gantt, and pie to C4, sankey, kanban, and radar - rendered without a web engine
- Export as HTML, DOCX, or PDF - Right-click and pick "Export as..." for a self-contained web page, a Word document that opens natively, or a vector PDF; diagrams and math come along in every format
- Pandoc export - With pandoc installed (or pointed at in settings), the editor offers EPUB, OpenDocument, PowerPoint, RTF and LaTeX too; rich formats convert from Tinta's own HTML export so diagrams and math survive as vector graphics
- Sheets - An infinite canvas of notes, made from the start page (S), where a Sheet tour shows the moves: cards are Markdown files in the sheet's folder, joined by arrows and gathered in groups, zoomed from titles down to the rendered note. Arrow keys walk between cards and Tab grows a mind map; links written in the notes show as ghost lines; a group can be a lane that writes
status: into the notes dropped in it; the sheet compiles into one document, presents along its arrows, tidies itself, and turns a pasted Mermaid flowchart into cards. A .smd is readable Markdown with a JSON Canvas block, and Obsidian .canvas files open too. See Sheets
- Start page - Bare launches land on a launcher with recent files, quick actions labeled with your actual key bindings, and built-in guides; closing the last tab returns there, and Ctrl+T opens it as a new tab
- Review annotations - Select text and press to attach a note, stored as an invisible HTML comment in the file itself. Annotated passages get a tint and a marker rail beside the scrollbar; hover previews, click edits, and a copy-for-agent button turns the whole review into a paste-ready task list for any coding agent - as the agent fixes items and deletes the comments, the marks vanish live
Keyboard Shortcuts
| Key | Action |
|---|
B | Toggle folder browser |
Tab | Toggle table of contents (type to filter, Enter jumps) |
A | Annotate the selected text |
F / Ctrl+F | Open search |
Enter | Next search match |
Ctrl+Shift+F | Search results panel: every match beside the page |
ESC | Close overlay / Quit |
T | Open theme chooser |
S | Toggle stats overlay |
Ctrl+C | Copy selected text (or all if none selected) |
Ctrl+A | Select all text |
Ctrl+Scroll | Zoom in/out |
Arrow keys / J/K | Scroll |
Mouse back/forward / Alt+←/→ | Walk link jumps with scroll restore |
Page Up/Down | Page scroll |
Home/End | Jump to start/end |
Ctrl+G | Go to a line by its number, in the editor or the reading view |
: / Ctrl+E | Enter edit mode |
ESC ESC | Exit edit mode |
Ctrl+N | New quick note — a fresh window, start typing right away; Ctrl+S names it via the save dialog. While the note is still empty, an Open a file button (Ctrl+O) in the preview pane picks an existing file instead |
Ctrl+S | Save (in edit mode) |
Ctrl+Shift+S | Save As: the editor writes the buffer to a new path, the viewer saves a copy, and the document continues under the new name |
Ctrl+H | Find and replace (in edit mode): Tab switches fields, Enter replaces, Ctrl+Enter replaces all |
Customization
Shortcut profiles (Settings → Keyboard shortcuts): pick Windows
(E edits, F1 opens help, F searches — the default), Vim (/
searches, : edits, ? helps), or Custom. The Edit button opens a
shortcut editor: click an action, press its new key. Raw : and ?
always work regardless of profile.
Settings live in a plain INI file at %APPDATA%\Tinta\settings.ini (theme,
zoom, window placement, word wrap, and more — written on exit). The [Keys]
section holds the Custom profile's bindings if you prefer editing by hand:
change a value and restart Tinta. Accepted values are letters, digits,
Tab, Space, F1–F12, or any single character.
[Keys]
search=F
browse=B
toc=Tab
theme=T
stats=S
quit=Q
newfile=N
zen=F11
scrollup=K
scrolldown=J
edit=:
help=?
Ctrl combos (save, print, copy, word wrap…) are fixed. The help overlay and
context menu show whatever keys are currently bound.
Other settings of note: browserFocusPath=1 makes B open the file browser
with the path box focused and selected, so paste + Enter jumps anywhere
(also in Settings → General). tinta --new starts an untitled quick note
from the command line. The print preview offers 12.7, 19.05 and 25.4 mm page
margins; printMarginMm= takes any value from 5 to 50 for printing and PDF.
cjkFont= names an installed face for a document's Chinese, Japanese and
Korean letters, ahead of the ones Tinta falls back to (Microsoft YaHei UI
first on most systems): a face with lighter bold weights, such as Source Han
Sans or DengXian, sets bold CJK more evenly. mathFont= names one for
equations, such as Latin Modern Math. Both are read at start, and a face that
is not installed is passed over.
The interface language is available in Settings → General. It follows the
Windows display language by default, or can be changed explicitly. Transient
notifications and native error dialogs use the same language. Additional
translations can be added through languages.ini; the app remains a native,
single-file Windows viewer with no web runtime.
Building
Requires Windows with Visual Studio 2019+ and CMake 3.15+.
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..
cmake --build . --config Release
The executable will be at build/Release/tinta.exe.
Usage
# Open a Markdown file
tinta.exe document.md
# Open a Mermaid flowchart
tinta.exe diagram.mmd
# Open with light theme
tinta.exe -l document.md
# Show stats on startup
tinta.exe -s document.md
# Register for Markdown and Mermaid files
tinta.exe /register
Or simply drag and drop a .md, .mmd or .puml file onto the window (.plantuml works too).
To copy a document's full path, right-click the document or its tab (the filename
in the title bar when only one file is open) and choose
Copy file path, beside Reveal in Explorer. The tab menu copies the clicked
tab's path, even if another tab is active. Untitled notes have no path until saved.
File Association
On first launch, Tinta will ask if you want to set it as the default viewer for Markdown, Mermaid and PlantUML files. If you choose "No", you won't be asked again.
To register Tinta as the default viewer later, run:
tinta.exe /register
This registers .md, .markdown, .mmd, .puml and .plantuml so you can select Tinta as their default app in Windows Settings.
Mermaid Support
Tinta natively renders twenty-two Mermaid diagram families in .mmd files and fenced mermaid code blocks — no web engine involved:
- Flowcharts (
flowchart / graph) - TB/TD, BT, LR, RL layouts, subgraph groups, common node shapes, directed and labeled edges, classDef/class/style styling, and graceful handling of Mermaid 11 edge IDs and node configs
- Sequence diagrams - participants and actors with aliases and
<br/> breaks, every arrow family, activations, notes, autonumber, and loop/alt/opt/par/critical/break frames
- Class diagrams - member blocks, stereotypes,
~T~ generics, all relation kinds with multiplicities, note and note for
- State diagrams -
[*] start/end, choice/fork/join, descriptions, directions, inline notes
- ER diagrams - attribute tables with keys, full crow's-foot cardinality notation
- C4 diagrams (
C4Context/C4Container/C4Component/C4Dynamic/C4Deployment) - persons, systems, containers, and components in the standard C4 palette, nested boundaries, labeled relations
- Requirement diagrams - typed requirement and element boxes with labeled relations
- Architecture diagrams (
architecture-beta) - services with line-art icons, groups, junctions, and side-anchored edges
- Block diagrams (
block-beta) - column grids, spans, spaces, nested blocks, block arrows, labeled edges
- Sankey diagrams (
sankey-beta) - ranked nodes with smooth flow ribbons
- Packet diagrams (
packet-beta) - 32-bit rows with labeled bit-range fields
- Kanban boards - columns and cards with ticket, assignee, and priority metadata
- Treemaps (
treemap-beta) and radar charts (radar-beta)
- Pie charts, git graphs, gantt charts (including the numeric
dateFormat X axis), mindmaps, timelines, user journeys, quadrant charts, and ()
Diagrams follow the active theme, print through Ctrl+P, export as SVG in HTML and as crisp images in DOCX, and their text is selectable and searchable like any other content. Anything a native renderer does not cover yet (composite states, zenuml) falls back to readable source code.
PlantUML Support
PlantUML diagrams render through the real PlantUML tool. Tinta never bundles PlantUML, never downloads anything, and makes no network calls - you point it at a tool you already have: either a native plantuml.exe, or a plantuml.jar run through the java found on your PATH. PlantUML runs in its sandbox security profile, so a diagram in a document you open cannot read files from your disk or fetch anything from the network.
- Configuration - the Settings dialog has a PlantUML diagrams row. Press Browse and pick the exe or the jar; the row then shows the exact command Tinta resolved (for a jar, the
java executable plus the jar path). A plantuml.exe on PATH is auto-detected without touching any setting. The choice persists as plantumlPath in settings.ini.
- What renders - fenced
plantuml, puml and pu blocks inside Markdown, and standalone .puml or .plantuml files, which open straight as a diagram and join the open/save dialogs, drag-and-drop and file-association registration.
- Diagram families - every family the real tool draws from an
@startuml block: sequence, use case, class, activity, component, state, object, deployment, timing, gantt and the rest. Detection is anchored on @startuml (named blocks such as @startuml Flow and @startuml(Flow) included); non-UML PlantUML start tags such as @startjson, @startyaml or @startmindmap are not detected and fall back to readable source.
- Where it works - the preview, print and PDF export, HTML export (the SVG PlantUML produced is inlined), DOCX export (a PNG is embedded), and the copy-diagram-as-image button (a 2x PNG). The editor's diagram-template picker offers three PlantUML starters: sequence, class and activity.
- Fallback - no tool configured, no
@startuml anchor, or a failed or timed-out render leaves readable source code on the page - never a broken image.
PlantUML ships several license flavors, and some of them (the plantuml-mit jar, for example) omit a few non-UML extras such as ditaa while still generating every UML diagram; Tinta works with any flavor. Setup and troubleshooting: PlantUML support.
Themes
Press T to open the theme chooser:
Light Themes:
- Paper - Warm sepia, literary feel
- Sakura - Soft pink elegance
- Arctic - Cool blue-white
- Meadow - Fresh green
- Dusk - Warm gray twilight
Dark Themes:
- Midnight - Deep blue-black
- Dracula - Purple-tinted dark
- Forest - Deep green
- Ember - Warm charcoal
- Abyss - Pure black (OLED-friendly)
Custom themes live in themes.ini beside the portable executable, or in
%APPDATA%\Tinta. Add inlinecode to a [theme] section to color inline code
independently of fenced blocks:
code=334455
inlinecode=B00020
Here inline code is red and plain fenced code stays neutral. Syntax highlighting
keeps its own colors. Without inlinecode, inline code uses code as before.
The override is preserved when saving a theme from the editor and applies to
HTML and DOCX exports. Native printing keeps Tinta's light print palette, set in
the theme's fonts.
For supported code-fence languages and aliases, including SQL, PowerShell, Java,
PHP, HTML/XML, CSS, YAML and Markdown, see Syntax highlighting.
The Frontmatter settings page controls property display and optional created/updated dates.
Named, repeated and multiline footnotes include native navigation and HTML/DOCX export.
Individual H1-H6, marked-text, bold, italic, selection and rule colours are described in Theme colours.
Dependencies
- MD4C - Fast markdown parser (fetched automatically by CMake)
- Windows Direct2D/DirectWrite (system libraries)
License
MIT
