The present disclosure is directed toward systems, methods, and non-transitory computer readable media for generating, providing, and editing collaborative content items on client devices. For example, the disclosed systems provide a collaborative content item that includes a text display state and a render display state. A client device can provide for the collaborative content item to receive source text in the text display state. Then, based on the source text, the client device can provide for display of the collaborative content item in the render display state that generates a graphical representation for the collaborative content item based on rendering the source text. In some embodiments, the disclosed systems and methods allow two or more client devices to simultaneously modify the source text associated with the collaborative content item, and in turn, modify the graphical representation of the collaborative content item based on the modified source text.