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Line Breaks in Markdown

Force a line break in Markdown by ending the line with two spaces, or with a backslash, or by inserting the HTML tag <br>. A single newline alone does not break the line — it joins into the same paragraph.

The three ways to break a line

Two trailing spaces are the classic syntax but invisible in editors and often stripped by formatters; the backslash and <br> are explicit and survive reformatting.

Line one·· (two trailing spaces)
Line two\
Line three<br>Line four

Paragraphs vs line breaks

A blank line starts a new paragraph (with vertical spacing). A line break keeps the text in the same paragraph on a new line. Single newlines in the source are collapsed to a space in standard Markdown — although some renderers (Obsidian, many chat apps) treat every newline as a break.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does pressing Enter once not create a new line in Markdown?

Standard Markdown collapses single newlines into a space so that source files can be hard-wrapped. End the line with two spaces or a backslash to force the break.

Try it live

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More Markdown syntax:

Markdown Headings →Bold and Italic in Markdown →Markdown Links →Markdown Images →Full Cheat Sheet →