Since its release in 2004, Markdown has become one of the most popular markup languages. Technical writers widely use Markdown for blogs, articles, documentation, etc. because of its lightweight simplicity and cross-platform usage; even this guide is written in Markdown behind the scenes.

GitHub uses its own version of markdown known as GitHub Flavored Markdown, enabling users to interact with other users, reference issues, or pull requests. Even if your project or repository doesn’t include any markdown or .md files, you will still have to use markdown for README, issues, pull requests, gists, etc.

Quite often, you will embed code snippets or blocks in Markdown. For example, embedding code when reporting a bug can save time and help the reviewers, maintainers, or anyone seeing that issue. You can also highlight code based on the programming language to improve the code’s readability and context.