Obsidian
Notes stored as plain files on your own machine, linked together.
Cost
Free to start, paid to go further
Free for personal use; paid add-ons for sync and publishing.
Open source
No
The code is private. You depend on the company that makes it.
Your data
Stays on your computer
Nothing is uploaded. This matters for anything confidential.
Use it for this
Building a knowledge base you own, in a format that will still open in twenty years.
Do not use it for this
Real-time collaboration. It is a personal tool.
A moment where you would reach for it
Keeping the answers you worked out once, so you do not research them twice.
How hard is it to pick up?
Straightforward, but expect an hour of figuring it out.
Worth knowing before you use it
Notes are plain Markdown files on your disk. No account required.
About this entry
Checked on 1 Sept 2026. Prices and free limits change without warning, and often quietly. Treat everything above as a starting point and confirm on the official site before you rely on it.
Nothing here is sponsored. A tool appears because it solves a real problem, not because someone paid for it to be listed.