Djot
Hacker ApprovedRanked 3 of 9 markup languages by recommenders
Recommended as a stricter, saner alternative to Markdown with a well-designed, extensible syntax. Common caveat: nested lists need blank lines, and critics note it lacks a formal specification.
Recommended as a stricter, saner alternative to Markdown with a well-designed, extensible syntax. Common caveat: nested lists need blank lines, and critics note it lacks a formal specification.
25 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 21
- criticize it
- 4
- approval share
- 84%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 21 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 5.3 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Stricter, saner take on Markdown
“It seems like a well designed and thorough superset of markdown.”
Comment from 27 Apr 2026 in “Quarkdown – Markdown with Superpowers” “it looks like it solves a lot of my complaints about markdown”
Comment from 23 Nov 2025 in “Markdown is holding you back” “It has all that I needed from markdown without any excess”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “How Markdown Took over the World” - Comment from 4 Apr 2026 in “Why the heck are we still using Markdown?”
- Comment from 6 Jul 2026 in “Shrimple – A Simpler, Nicer Markdown”
- Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “How Markdown Took over the World”
- Comment from 21 Jan 2026 in “Nested Code Fences in Markdown”
Well designed, extensible syntax
“It seems like a well designed and thorough superset of markdown.”
Comment from 27 Apr 2026 in “Quarkdown – Markdown with Superpowers” “a more fully featured document format like Djot”
Comment from 14 Jun 2026 in “Ask HN: What are you working on? (June 2026)” “feels very well designed and extensible too”
Comment from 18 Apr 2026 in “Show HN: MDV – a Markdown superset for docs, dashboards, and slides with data” Good base for embedded DSLs
“You need a well defined spec like djot as a DSL for this to work, so that parsers can be easily written for it.”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “Org Mode Syntax Is One of the Most Reasonable Markup Languages to Use for Text” “Would make a good DSL inside languages”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “Org Mode Syntax Is One of the Most Reasonable Markup Languages to Use for Text”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
No formal specification
“I like it, but it doesn’t seem to have a specification, making it hard to create a new implementation.”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “How Markdown Took over the World” “but it looks like making a grammar is secondary for them”
Comment from 28 Aug 2026 in “Emacs 31: An unofficial guide to Markdown-ts-mode” “Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to have a formal spec.”
Comment from 23 Nov 2025 in “Markdown is holding you back” - Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “How Markdown Took over the World”
Nested lists need blank lines
“its requirement to write nested lists with blank lines between every change in indentation is a dealbreaker for me”
Comment from 4 Apr 2026 in “Why the heck are we still using Markdown?” “djot requires a blank line before nested lists (at least in the default mode)”
Comment from 29 Apr 2026 in “Quarkdown – Markdown with Superpowers”
Other markup languages people recommend
The four most recommended other markup languages, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Markdown | 155 | 73 | 68% | 12 | 10 yrs3 owners | Approved |
| AsciiDoc | 38 | 11 | 78% | 12 | — | Approved |
| DjotThis page | 21 | 4 | 84% | 7 | — | Approved |
| reStructuredText | 19 | 9 | 68% | 8 | — | Approved |
| Quarkdown | 19 | 8 | 70% | 3 | — | — |
What people said
26 of the 28 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“smooths out the parts of CommonMark's syntax that make it complex and slow to parse”
“but it looks like making a grammar is secondary for them”
“we'd have been better off if somehow djot had been able to come first”
“Djot is great, I wrote a web server that uses it natively.”
“My favourite attempt to improve markdown is djot”
“a more fully featured document format like Djot”
“djot requires a blank line before nested lists (at least in the default mode)”
“It seems like a well designed and thorough superset of markdown.”
“feels very well designed and extensible too”
“its requirement to write nested lists with blank lines between every change in indentation is a dealbreaker for me”
“too little (preserves weird whitespace semantics requiring extra newlines, non-obvious _under_ for /italics/ markers”
“seems to be very sane and still very similar to markdown”
“It makes quite a few right calls, but still tries to not be a strict subset of Markdown, requiring e.g. a different editing mode.”
“something more sane like djot”
“Considering the clear markdown lineage id expect there would be easier memorability”
“Would make a good DSL inside languages”
“You need a well defined spec like djot as a DSL for this to work, so that parsers can be easily written for it.”
“That’s a reference, not a specification.”
“I think this is what you're looking for”
“I like it, but it doesn’t seem to have a specification, making it hard to create a new implementation.”
“I don't know who actually likes curly quotes, they are clearly excess to me.”
“It has all that I needed from markdown without any excess”
“looks like a stricter, more sane Markdown!”
“it looks like it solves a lot of my complaints about markdown”
“Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to have a formal spec.”
“I've no regrets since then”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.