Split view — read two markdown files side by side
Open two .md files in the same window with synchronized scroll. The Pro feature for comparing RFC and reply, agent diff vs original, before and after.
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Split view opens two markdown files in the same window, side by side. Scroll one and the other follows — heading-anchored, not pixel-anchored, so the documents stay paired even when one is twice as long as the other.
It’s a Pro feature. The 14-day in-app trial unlocks it without a license key.
How to open it
Open the first file as normal. Then:
- Press Ctrl+Alt+S.
- A second pane slides in. Drag a file onto it, or click “Open file” in the pane and pick one.
To swap which side a file is on, drag the pane header. To close the right pane, press Ctrl+Alt+S again or click the × in its header.
Synchronized scrolling
The two panes are scroll-linked by default. Scrolling either pane moves the other to the matching heading position — so if you’re at the “Background” section in the left pane, the right pane scrolls to its “Background” too, even if it’s hundreds of lines further down or back.
Click the link icon between the panes to toggle sync off — then each pane scrolls independently, useful for reading a reference doc alongside something you’re inspecting line-by-line.
What it’s good for
RFC and reply
You wrote an RFC. A reviewer wrote a reply. Open both side by side, scroll through, and the relevant counter-points line up with the sections they address. The right pane is the conversation; the left is what the conversation is about.
Agent diff vs original
You ran an AI agent over a doc — Claude rewrote architecture.md.
You want the original next to the rewrite to read them together
instead of a line-diff. Open architecture.md from git stash
or a backup on the left, the new version on the right. Compare
prose, not diff hunks.
Before / after
Two snapshots of the same doc — last week’s plan and this week’s. Sync scroll, see what’s changed in flow rather than in patches.
Two unrelated docs
Sometimes you just need both open. A spec and its tests. A README and a CHANGELOG. The product brief and the open question list. Sync scroll off, two windows in one.
Limits
- Two panes max. Triple split was prototyped; the screen real estate at typical laptop widths didn’t justify it. Use two separate windows if you need three documents.
- Both panes are read-only. Editing happens in your editor.
- Each pane reloads independently. The watcher tracks both files; one updating doesn’t reset the other’s scroll.
Comparison
| App | Side-by-side .md | Sync scroll | Heading-anchored sync |
|---|---|---|---|
| MD View Pro | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| VS Code preview | Yes (split editor) | Pixel-only | No |
| Typora | No (single doc only) | n/a | n/a |
| Obsidian | Yes | Plugin-dependent | Plugin-dependent |
See also
- Git-diff overlay — when you want diff hunks in one document instead of two whole files.
- Live reload — both panes update on file changes.
- Pricing — $24 lifetime for Pro.