diff --git a/tabled/formats/markdown.py b/tabled/formats/markdown.py
index 9049628..67244d2 100644
--- a/tabled/formats/markdown.py
+++ b/tabled/formats/markdown.py
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@
 
 
 def replace_special_chars(text):
-    return text.replace("|", "\|").replace("-", "\-")
+    return text.replace("|", "\\|").replace("-", "\\-")
 
 
 def replace_all(text):