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Mermaid

Open-source JavaScript library that turns Markdown-like text into diagrams.

Open sourceSelf-hostableDiagramming tools
Visit MermaidSee 6 alternatives
Verified facts
4 of 4
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6
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About Mermaid

Mermaid lets you describe a diagram in a short text syntax and renders it as an image in the browser. It supports flowcharts, sequence, class, state and entity-relationship diagrams, Gantt charts, user journeys, Git graphs, mind maps and more. Because diagrams are plain text, they can be versioned in Git, reviewed in pull requests and kept next to the code they describe, and many tools render Mermaid natively, including GitHub, GitLab, Notion, Obsidian and Confluence apps. The project is MIT licensed and free; you can try it in the online Mermaid Live Editor. Its creators also run Mermaid Chart, a separate commercial editor with visual editing, AI and team features. The trade-off is control: automatic layout decides where boxes go, so large or carefully arranged diagrams can be hard to get looking right, and styling options are limited compared with a drawing tool.

Best for: Developers who want diagrams as text that render in GitHub, docs and wikis.

Pros and cons

What works

  • Diagrams are plain text you can version and review
  • Rendered natively by GitHub, GitLab and many doc tools
  • Free and MIT licensed
  • Covers many diagram types

Why people leave

  • Little control over layout
  • Large diagrams become hard to read
  • Styling options are limited

Top Mermaid alternatives

See all 6
  1. 1PlantUML logo
    PlantUML

    Older text-to-diagram tool with deeper UML coverage and finer layout options.

    66.5
  2. 2D2 logo
    D2

    Newer diagram language with better-looking layouts and more styling control.

    62.6
  3. 3Gr
    Graphviz

    The classic graph layout engine for large node-and-edge graphs.

    59.6
  4. 4Eraser logo
    Eraser

    Diagrams as code with a visual editor, AI and team features on top.

    57.2
  5. 5Structurizr logo
    Structurizr

    Models software architecture once in a DSL and generates many C4 views.

    55.3

Why people left Mermaid

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Mermaid: common questions

Is Mermaid free?

Yes. Mermaid is free, open-source software that you can host yourself.

Is Mermaid open source?

Yes. The source code is on GitHub at mermaid-js/mermaid. You can also run it on your own server.

What platforms does Mermaid run on?

Mermaid is available for Web and Self-hosted.

What are the best alternatives to Mermaid?

The highest-ranked Mermaid alternatives right now are PlantUML, D2 and Graphviz. See the full ranked list for pricing, platforms and verified facts.

See all 6 Mermaid alternatives