Headings and paragraphs
Set the page title in Page Settings. Use sections here; published body headings move down one level.
Markdown, kept readable
Markdown cheat sheet and formatting guide.
A practical guide to the text, page settings and portable routes PasteMode publishes — with the real renderer used for every result below.
Open editorCommonMark + GFM + safe extensions · raw HTML disabled · private by default
Start here
Quick start
The small set of patterns that carries most useful writing.
Emphasis, strike and links
Emphasise sparingly and give every link a meaningful label.
**Strong**, _quiet emphasis_ and ~~removed~~.
[A useful source](https://example.com "Source title")Strong, quiet emphasis and removed.
Shape the page
Structure
Lists, tasks, quotations and dividers stay readable as plain text.
Nested lists and tasks
Indent nested items consistently. Task boxes remain readable in raw Markdown.
- One clear point
- Supporting detail
- Another point
1. First step
2. Second step
- [ ] Draft
- [x] Reviewed- One clear point
- Supporting detail
- Another point
- First step
- Second step
- Draft
- Reviewed
Quotes, rules and comments
Reference definitions can hold private author notes without appearing in the page.
> Write the page you would want to receive.
---
[//]: # (This author note is not rendered.)Write the page you would want to receive.
PasteMode extensions
Rich text, without HTML
A small, safe syntax layer adds highlights, spoilers, color, callouts, alignment and a generated table of contents.
Highlight, underline and spoilers
Reveal a spoiler with its checkbox: click, tap or press Space. Hidden text is also hidden from screen readers until revealed.
==Highlighted text==
!~Underlined text~!
!>A keyboard-accessible spoilerHighlighted text
Underlined text
A keyboard-accessible spoiler
Named and hex text colors
Use CSS color names or three/six-digit hex. A page may use up to 64 distinct hex colors.
%red% **Important** %% · %purple% Creative %% · %pink% Warm %%
%#ACBDEF% Custom hex %% · !~green;double; Underline options ~!Important · Creative · Warm
Custom hex · Underline options
Callouts
Use GitHub alerts or !!! with info, note, warning, danger or greentext. Indent continued blocks by four spaces; body Markdown stays intact.
> [!NOTE]
> Keep **context** close.
!!! greentext A useful detail
This note keeps its _emphasis_.Contents and alignment
A contents list appears with at least three eligible headings and follows their hierarchy. Alignment preserves emphasis, links and allowed images.
Technical writing
Code and data
Fenced code uses its language label for syntax highlighting; GFM tables support alignment.
Inline and fenced code
Name the language after the opening fence. Add {numbers} for line numbers up to 2,000 lines; longer blocks stay unnumbered. Copy keeps only the source. Preview colors common languages; publication adds colors for less common ones. Unknown names stay readable as text.
Run `npm run check`, then inspect the result.
```js {numbers}
const page = { readable: true };
```Run npm run check, then inspect the result.
const page = { readable: true };
Tables and alignment
Keep tables compact. Wide data remains horizontally scrollable on small screens.
| Item | State | Score |
| :--- | :---: | ---: |
| Draft | open | 4 |
| Review | done | 10 || Item | State | Score |
|---|---|---|
| Draft | open | 4 |
| Review | done | 10 |
Reader privacy
Images and media
Alt text is required. Only allowlisted PasteMode brand assets render inline; external images remain explicit links instead of silent tracking requests.
Images with useful alternatives
Use meaningful alt text and an optional title. Pixel sizes clamp to 4000; percentages to 500. #left/#right float an image; a separate !; clears floats. Uploads are not available.
{96px:96px}
!;
Footnotes and back-links
Footnotes keep stable, safe ids. Follow the arrow to return to the reference.
Reference-style links
Move long destinations to the bottom when they interrupt the writing flow.
Read the [CommonMark specification][commonmark].
[commonmark]: https://spec.commonmark.org/0.31.2/Read the CommonMark specification.
Beyond Markdown
Page settings
Publishing controls live beside the editor, so metadata never has to interrupt the document itself.
Identity
Title, description and a custom or generated URL.
Privacy
Public, unlisted or private; indexing, expiry and password.
Sharing
Dedicated social title, description and HTTPS preview image.
Reading
Width, surface, language, content warning and table of contents.
Use the page elsewhere
Publishing tools
Every published page keeps portable routes close at hand.
/raw/[slug]Read the original Markdown as plain UTF-8 text.
/download/[slug]Download the source with a safe attachment filename.
/embed/[slug]Use the minimal, explicitly enabled reading view.
/clone/[slug]Open a public page as a new local draft.
/api/v2/pastesCreate and manage pages with scoped API tokens.
pastemode CLIPlanned for a later release; not presented as available yet.
Exact behavior
Reference and limits
- Markdown baseline
- CommonMark + GFM
- Safe extensions
- Highlights at word boundaries, underline options, spoilers, named and hex colors, callouts, contents and alignment — all rendered without raw HTML.
- Escapes and line breaks
- Escape extension punctuation with a backslash. Single newlines follow CommonMark; use two trailing spaces for a hard break. Imported Rentry documents can use a dedicated line-break mode, including literal \n inside tables.
- Render limits
- Markdown is limited to 300,000 characters, bounded nesting and complexity. Live preview pauses above 100,000 characters. Unsupported emoji shortcodes, math, Mermaid, definition lists and raw HTML do not add active content.
- Raw HTML
- Ignored and never executed. Preview reports dropped HTML; use Markdown or code fences instead.
- External images
- Shown as source links to avoid passive reader tracking.
- External links
- Carry ugc, nofollow, noopener and noreferrer. Image source links open separately.