Google Docs adds native Markdown editing, narrowing gap with Obsidian
Google began rolling out native editing for .md and .markdown files on Oct. 5 for all Workspace customers and personal Google accounts, so files opened from Drive stay Markdown instead of being converted into Google Docs; users can share, comment and co-edit them, and Drive renders previews with formatted tables and clickable links. Google tied the update to AI workflows in its Workspace announcement, noting Markdown is widely used by large language models to preserve headings, lists and tables and that native support lets people and software agents work on the same files without repeated conversions. Some Docs formatting does not survive: smart chips become text or links, HTML becomes plain text, and font colors, highlights and alignment are removed; rollout can take up to 15 days.
For teams that treat Markdown as the shared format between LLMs and agents, Docs can now host the review and collaboration step, though linked-note knowledge bases remain Obsidian's territory.