Glow: Render Markdown Beautifully in Your Terminal

TL;DR — Quick Summary

Glow renders Markdown files beautifully in your terminal. Read READMEs, docs, and notes with syntax highlighting, word wrap, and a stash for favorites.

Glow turns your terminal into a Markdown reader. READMEs, documentation, notes — all rendered beautifully with styled headers, code blocks, and tables.

Installation

# macOS
brew install glow

# Arch Linux
sudo pacman -S glow

# Snap
sudo snap install glow

# Go install
go install github.com/charmbracelet/glow@latest

Usage

# Render a specific file
glow README.md
glow CHANGELOG.md
glow docs/guide.md

# Browse all Markdown in current directory
glow

# Read from stdin
cat README.md | glow -
echo "# Hello" | glow -

# Read from URL
glow https://raw.githubusercontent.com/charmbracelet/glow/main/README.md

# Set width
glow -w 80 README.md

# Pager mode (less-like scrolling)
glow -p README.md

# Style themes
glow -s dark README.md
glow -s light README.md
glow -s notty README.md   # No colors (for piping)

Comparison

Feature	Glow	bat	cat	mdcat
Renders MD	Yes	No (source)	No	Yes
Code blocks	Styled	Highlighted	Raw	Styled
Tables	Formatted	Raw	Raw	Formatted
Links	Colored	Raw	Raw	Colored
Stash	Yes	No	No	No
URLs	Yes	No	No	Yes

Summary

Glow renders Markdown in the terminal — styled headers, code blocks, tables, links
Browse all Markdown in a directory or render a specific file
Read from URLs, stdin, or local files
Built-in stash to save favorite documents
Dark/light style themes and configurable width

Guide & Instructions

Estimated Time: 2m

Tools Needed:

Glow
Terminal

Install Glow

Install with brew install glow, pacman -S glow, snap install glow, or go install github.com/charmbracelet/glow@latest.

Read a file

Run glow README.md to render any Markdown file.

Browse directory

Run glow (no args) to browse all Markdown files in the current directory.

Read from URL

Run glow https://example.com/file.md to render remote files.

Stash favorites

Press s in the browser to stash a document for later.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Glow?

Glow is a terminal-based Markdown reader. It renders Markdown files with styling — headers, code blocks with syntax highlighting, tables, links, and proper formatting — directly in your terminal. Built by Charmbracelet.

How is Glow different from cat or bat?

cat shows raw Markdown source. bat shows Markdown source with syntax highlighting. Glow actually renders the Markdown — headers are styled, code blocks are boxed, links are colored, and tables are formatted. It's like a browser for Markdown.

Can Glow read from URLs?

Yes, glow https://raw.githubusercontent.com/user/repo/main/README.md renders remote Markdown files directly.

What is the Glow stash?

Glow has a built-in stash that lets you save and organize favorite Markdown documents for quick access later.