I've started using typst for small local documents that I would previously have written in markdown (or R-markdown). Typst offers programming features that are very helpful for small writing tasks that need more customization than markdown provides but that don't need the wildly expansive set of templates available in the latex world.

Like other academics, I plan to stick with latex for journal articles and books, unless publishers provide support for typst.

Markdown still has a place for files on github, because that means that web browsers will display formatted material, not just the raw code. A similar thing applies to code documentation, with many systems (R, Julia, etc) supporting various flavours of markdown.

I recommend typst to students for small tasks like assignments. It offers more typesetting power than markdown, it's a great replacement for msword, and it's easier to learn than latex.

Long story short, typst fills a niche. But it's not the be-all and end-all, at least in my (natural science) field.

> Like other academics, I plan to stick with latex for journal articles and books, unless publishers provide support for typst.

In my undergrad we sent all our essays etc as LaTeX and it was honestly very usable. I assume this was somewhat dependent on having a wealth of enthusiast professors and postgrads to develop the templates though...?

Since then, I've used LaTeX in a "freeform" way and absolutely hated it, I will definitely be trying Typst next time I need more than Markdown/RST.

But I can imagine that if you are unlucky, working with the journal-provided templates could be WORSE - if the templates suck you are surely in a world of pain!

I imagine that it would be productive to write a draft of a paper or book in Typist, and then do the painful LaTeX writing for the later and final drafts. The pain saved on early drafts would outweigh the cost of doing some work twice.