diff --git a/docs-requirements.txt b/docs-requirements.txt
index a2223745..8a0d1c8e 100644
--- a/docs-requirements.txt
+++ b/docs-requirements.txt
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
+myst-parser  # For parsing markdown docs instead of rst
 Sphinx >= 1.3.1
 sphinx-autoapi
 sphinx-rtd-theme >= 0.2.5b1
-recommonmark >= 0.4.0
diff --git a/docs/custom_extensions/custom_recommonmark.py b/docs/custom_extensions/custom_recommonmark.py
deleted file mode 100644
index f7e767b6..00000000
--- a/docs/custom_extensions/custom_recommonmark.py
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,8 +0,0 @@
-from recommonmark.parser import CommonMarkParser
-from docutils import nodes
-
-# treats "verbatim" (code without a language specified) as a code sample
-class AllCodeCommonMarkParser(CommonMarkParser):
-    def verbatim(self, text):
-        node = nodes.literal_block(text, text)
-        self.current_node.append(node)
diff --git a/docs/source/conf.py b/docs/source/conf.py
index b7a88039..8d99409a 100644
--- a/docs/source/conf.py
+++ b/docs/source/conf.py
@@ -20,8 +20,6 @@
 
 sys.path.insert(0, os.path.abspath('../custom_extensions'))
 
-from custom_recommonmark import AllCodeCommonMarkParser
-
 # -- General configuration -----------------------------------------------------
 
 # If your documentation needs a minimal Sphinx version, state it here.
@@ -30,6 +28,7 @@
 # Add any Sphinx extension module names here, as strings. They can be extensions
 # coming with Sphinx (named 'sphinx.ext.*') or your custom ones.
 extensions = [
+  'myst_parser',
   'sphinx.ext.autodoc',
   'sphinx.ext.intersphinx',
   'sphinx.ext.viewcode',
@@ -47,14 +46,11 @@
 # Add any paths that contain templates here, relative to this directory.
 templates_path = ['_templates']
 
-# Parsers for different suffixes
-source_parsers = {
-    '.md': AllCodeCommonMarkParser
-}
-
 # The suffix of source filenames.
 source_suffix = ['.rst', '.md']
 
+myst_all_links_external = True
+
 # The encoding of source files.
 #source_encoding = 'utf-8-sig'