mdBook vs MkDocs
mdBook
rust-lang.github.ioMkDocs
mkdocs.orgSide by side
| Figure | mdBook | MkDocs |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | — |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | — | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 0 |
| Spec score · Documentation Generators | 7.8 (#12) | 7.6 (#17) |
| Audience | The project describes mdBook as ideal for product or API documentation, tutorials, and course materials. | MkDocs is intended for people building project documentation sites from Markdown files. |
| Customization | Theme files allow users to customize the formatting of the output. | Users can customize themes, install plugins, enable Markdown extensions, and configure many options. |
| Deployment | mdBook builds static output files into a `book` directory that can be transferred to a web service. | MkDocs documents deployment to GitHub Pages and Read the Docs and states that any static-file hosting provider can be used. |
| Integrations | The documentation describes using GitHub Actions or GitLab CI/CD to test and deploy books automatically. | MkDocs documentation can be deployed to GitHub Pages and hosted on Amazon S3. |
| Purpose | mdBook is a command-line tool for creating books from Markdown, including product or API documentation, tutorials, and course materials. | MkDocs is a static site generator geared toward building project documentation from Markdown and a single YAML configuration file. |
| Search | mdBook includes integrated search support. | The generated site includes search that can find text on pages and link directly to matching sections. |
| Support | The project directs users to its GitHub issue tracker for issues and feature requests and relies on community contributions to fix bugs and add features. | The project directs users to GitHub Discussions and GitHub Issues for help. |
Plans
In their own words
mdBook
mdBook is a free command-line tool for creating books from Markdown, including product and API documentation, tutorials, and course materials. It builds static output files in a book directory that can be transferred to a web service. Integrated search and syntax highlighting for code blocks help readers navigate and read examples, while theme files allow formatting changes. Preprocessors can add custom syntax or modify content; backends can render output to multiple formats. The `mdbook test` command tests Rust code samples in a book. Project documentation describes using GitHub Actions or GitLab CI/CD to test and deploy books automatically. Developers can also import mdBook libraries or use its plugin mechanism to build custom tooling and output backends. It runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows, and Markdown is its source input. Building from source requires Rust and Cargo, with Rust 1.88 as the stated minimum. The project directs issues and feature requests to its GitHub issue tracker and relies on community contributions for bug fixes and added features. The free, open-source plan is licensed under MPL-2.0.
MkDocs
MkDocs is a static site generator for project documentation written in Markdown, with project settings held in a YAML file. It produces static HTML that can be published to GitHub Pages, Amazon S3, or another static-file host. Its development server provides a local preview and refreshes it when documentation changes; generated sites also include search that can link to matching sections. The command-line tools cover creating a project, serving a preview, building the site, checking dependencies, and deploying to GitHub Pages. MkDocs uses Python-Markdown and requires a recent Python version and pip. The built-in mkdocs and readthedocs themes are available alongside third-party and custom themes, while plugins, Markdown extensions, and configuration options allow further changes. The built-in mkdocs theme supports several locales, including English, German, Spanish, French, Japanese, and Chinese. MkDocs is free, available for Linux, macOS, Windows, and self-hosted use, and distributed under the BSD license. Third-party themes and plugins run their authors’ code without sandboxing.