Runestone is a gorgeous new & lightweight text editor for iPhone and iPad

By Oliver Haslam
published

Runescape Header Art
Runescape Header Art (Image credit: Simon B. Støvring)

What you need to know

  • Runestone is a new lightweight text editor for iPhone and iPad.
  • Support for syntax highlighting is included, among many other features.
  • Download Runestone for free with an in-app purchase unlocking additional premium features.

If you're someone who needs to write text, whether that's blog posts, code for a website, or anything else, you need a good text editor. Runestone is the latest entry into the world of cool, lightweight text editors for iPhone and iPad and it's one that you should absolutely be checking out.

Runestone is created by Simon B. Støvring, the same person behind the popular Scriptable and Data Jar apps. They were both power user offerings, but Runestone is much more accessible — and it's designed for anyone who needs to type text into an iPhone or iPad, whatever the reason.

Runestone does have some features of note, however. There's syntax highlighting for HTML, JavaScript, Swift, Markdown, and more, for example. There are twelve standard themes to allow people to tailor their text editor to suit their mood and the text itself can be customized — font type and font size changes are supported and custom fonts can be installed via third-party apps.

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Those who make heavy use of the Files app will be pleased to learn that Runestone uses the standard document picker for iOS and iPadOS, allowing you to just pull files out of an interface that will be immediately familiar. iPad user? Make use of the multi-window mode for those times where one just isn't enough! There's so much more, too! Be sure to head into the App Store to learn more. Remember, lightweight doesn't necessarily mean lacking in features!

Those looking to add a new text editor to the mix should check out Runestone ASAP. It's available in the App Store (opens in new tab) now and is a free download with an in-app purchase unlocking premium features that include:

  • Choose between eight app icons.
  • Show line numbers.
  • Highlight the selected line.
  • Increase line height and letter spacing.
  • Disable line wrapping to allow horizontal scrolling.
  • Show tabs, spaces, and line breaks using a selected symbol.
  • Enable page guide at a specific column to easily tell when lines are getting too long.
  • Add vertical and horizontal overscroll.
  • Remember the selected language per file.
  • Save file extensions and filenames that should always be treated as plain text files.
  • Enable soft tabs and choose the width of the tab character.
  • Specify whether pressing the tab key should insert a tab or indent the line.
  • Adjust the scaling of Markdown headings and disable highlighting of code blocks in Markdown.

That premium version is a single one-time $9.99 purchase which is a bargain if you're someone who writes a lot. Runestone has the potential to become one of the best iPhone and iPad text editors — and it's starting from a great place already.

Oliver Haslam
Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too.

Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.