Marp review
A developer-focused way to create, style, and export presentations from Markdown.
Reviewed by iTechGuides Editors · Editorial team · Updated Oct 2026
Marp is an open-source presentation ecosystem for developers and technical users who prefer writing slide decks as Markdown. Its tools include Marp Core, Marp CLI, and a Visual Studio Code extension for authoring, previewing, styling, and exporting presentations. Decks can use CommonMark-based syntax, directives, images, mathematics, built-in themes, custom CSS themes, and auto-scaling. The published feature set also includes presenter notes and presenter-view presentations.
The strongest fit is its developer tooling. The VS Code extension provides previewing, directive autocomplete, syntax highlighting, and diagnostics, while the extensible plugin and converter architecture supports a toolchain-oriented workflow. Directives can control themes, pagination, headers, footers, and slide styling. This makes Marp suitable for technical documentation, engineering presentations, and teams that want presentation files to work naturally alongside code and other text-based assets.
Marp also covers the main output and delivery needs of a presentation workflow. It exports decks to HTML, PDF, and PowerPoint, and can export slides as PNG or JPEG images. The ecosystem supports offline use and works across Windows, macOS, and Linux, with browser-related compatibility involving Chrome, Chromium, Edge, and Firefox. Its VS Code integration is central, and LibreOffice Impress is included among its integrations. Choose Marp when Markdown, CSS customization, and developer tooling matter most. A conventional hosted presentation application with a visual editor or collaboration-first workflow is likely a better fit for users who do not want to work primarily in text and code.
Marp pros and cons
- Where it wins
- Markdown and CommonMark authoring with version-control-friendly files
- VS Code preview, autocomplete, syntax highlighting, and diagnostics
- Exports to HTML, PDF, PowerPoint, PNG, and JPEG
- Where it doesn't
- Text-first authoring may not suit visual, drag-and-drop workflows
- Custom styling depends on directives, themes, and CSS knowledge
- The ecosystem is oriented toward technical users rather than hosted collaboration
Marp fact sheet, pricing and score →
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