Typst is a new markup-based typesetting system that is designed to be as powerful as LaTeX while being much easier to learn and use. [1.1]
References
- Type: Webpage. Title: “typst/typst”. Publisher: “GitHub”. Published (Modified): 2026-03-16T09:39:55.000Z. Accessed: 2025-03-18T08:55Z. URI: https://github.com/typst/typst.
- Type: File. Title: “README.md”.
- Type: Text. Location: ¶1.
- Type: File. Title: “README.md”.
What do you think it’s still lacking?
Maths feels like a first class citizen in latex. The syntax is ugly, but there is some logic through the legacy jank.
Typst makes fundamental design decisions that render it unsuitable beyond extremely simply equations. In LaTeX, curly braces are nearly always reserved for enclosing arguments, to avoid confusion with actual brackets.
Typst uses normal brackets for both its scripting and actual maths.
For example,
\frac{n(n+1)}{2}in latex turns into(n(n + 1)) / 2in typst. The typst code is incredibly unclear - the first set of brackets with the slash together actually form the fraction operator, so neither end up visible.You can see how this would start to struggle even with high school level maths, with bracketed terms and possibly fractional terms in exponents, integrals, etc.
For example, it is very difficult for me to work out the difference between the following three in typst. That is specifically not what you want from a typesetting language.
1/2(x + y) 1/x(x + y) 1/2^x(x + y)LaTeX ignores whitespace, so you can just use a formatter to space out your code and ensure the curly braces. This is not even an option in typst, which uses the space as an escape character.
Update (2026-03-20T00:37Z): @Meron35@lemmy.world, it has since been found that Typst is aware of this inconsistency [7].
I think these are valid complaints. For clarity, this is the output that I found for each:
I was surprised by the second; I expected it to produce
[6]. I didn’t know what to expect for the third.
I tried searching through the documentation [4], but I was unable to find any information that exactly defined expressions [5], and how they are grouped within the fraction when juxtaposed like in your examples.
References
echo "#set page(width: auto, height: auto, margin: 0pt); $ 1/2(x + y) $" | typst compile - o.pngecho "#set page(width: auto, height: auto, margin: 0pt); $ 1/x(x + y) $" | typst compile - o.pngecho "#set page(width: auto, height: auto, margin: 0pt); $ 1/2^x(x + y) $" | typst compile - o.pngecho "#set page(width: auto, height: auto, margin: 0pt); $ 1/x (x + y) $" | typst compile - o.pngI’m not sure I exactly follow what you mean. Could you elaborate?
Note that one can also write that as
frac(n(n+1), 2)[1][4].References
echo "#set page(width: auto, height: auto, margin: 0pt); $ (n(n + 1)) / 2 $" | typst compile - o.pngecho "#set page(width: auto, height: auto, margin: 0pt); $ frac(n(n+1), 2) $" | typst compile - o.png(n(n + 1)) / 2, andfrac(n(n+1), 2)result inIMO, it’s only unclear if one isn’t familiar with the syntax — I think the documentation states the behaviour clearly:
This isn’t in defense of Typist’s syntax, but I challenge you to show the uninitiated your example LaTeX expression,
\frac{n(n+1)}{2}, and see if they are able to accurately parse it.References
The infix syntax is not great, but you can at least write
frac(n (n + 1), 2)and it renders the way you would expect.Edit:
Technically LaTeX does this too with omitted curly braces:
Everyone just quickly learns to not do that.
The ability to load custom fonts comes to mind. I remember when I was converting my document from TeX to Typst was that I wasn’t able to just specify my .ttf file path.
I don’t know what Typst’s custom font support was like in the past, but, currently [1], Typst does allow the usage of custom fonts:
--font-pathargument or theTYPST_FONT_PATHSenvironment variable [1.3].References