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MD009 - Remove trailing spaces

Aliases: no-trailing-spaces

What this rule does

Removes unnecessary spaces at the end of lines to keep your Markdown clean and consistent.

Why this matters

  • Clean diffs: Trailing spaces create noisy changes in version control
  • Parser compatibility: Some Markdown tools have issues with trailing whitespace
  • Professional quality: Clean files without hidden characters look more polished
  • File size: Removing unnecessary spaces reduces file size (slightly but it adds up!)

Examples

✅ Correct

This line ends cleanly
No extra spaces here
Perfect formatting

❌ Incorrect

This line has trailing spaces  
Extra spaces at the end 
Why are these spaces here?

🔧 Fixed

This line ends cleanly
Extra spaces removed
Clean and tidy now

Configuration

[MD009]
br-spaces = 2                  # Trailing spaces kept as a hard line break; 0 keeps none (default: 2)
strict = false                 # Also flag br-spaces runs that render no line break (default: false)
list-item-empty-lines = false  # Allow trailing spaces in empty list item lines (default: false)

Fewer than 2 trailing spaces never render a line break, so br-spaces = 0 (or 1) turns the exception off: a run of 2 spaces is then flagged like any other trailing spaces. The other exemptions still apply (code blocks unless strict, the single space of an empty blockquote line, and list-item-empty-lines). This matches markdownlint.

Automatic fixes

This rule automatically removes trailing spaces from the end of lines. A run of exactly br-spaces spaces (2 by default) is kept as an intentional hard line break.

With strict = true, that run is kept only where it renders a line break: on a line inside a paragraph that is followed by more of the same paragraph. On a heading, a fence line, the last line of a paragraph or list item, and anywhere else the <br> would be invisible, the spaces are flagged and removed. Strict mode also checks lines inside code blocks, which are otherwise skipped. To remove rendering line breaks as well, set br-spaces = 0.

Learn more

  • MD010 - Use spaces instead of tabs
  • MD047 - End files with a single newline