Compare / Obsidian vs Roam Research

Obsidian vs Roam Research

Obsidian is a free, local-first Markdown knowledge base with a plugin ecosystem thousands strong; Roam Research is the pioneering outliner that made bidirectional links and daily notes famous. Here’s how they compare on pricing, platforms, linking, search, capture and collaboration — and how to decide between them.

What is Obsidian?

Obsidian stores your notes as plain Markdown files in a folder on your own device — a “vault” you can read with any text editor, back up however you like, and keep forever. On top of those files it layers backlinks, a graph view, a Canvas whiteboard, and Bases (native database views over your notes, added in 2025). The app is completely free, including for commercial use since early 2025.

Its defining feature is the community: roughly two thousand plugins extend it with everything from spaced repetition to Kanban boards to AI integrations. Official add-ons are paid — Sync ($4/month, end-to-end encrypted) keeps vaults identical across devices, and Publish ($8/month) turns notes into a public site. There’s no web app; Obsidian runs as desktop and mobile apps against your local files.

What is Roam Research?

Roam Research kicked off the modern “tools for thought” wave in 2020. Every note is an outline of blocks; any block can be referenced, embedded and linked from anywhere else, and the daily-notes page makes capture frictionless. Bidirectional links — see every place a page is mentioned — were its signature idea, since adopted by nearly every tool in this list.

Roam runs as a cloud-hosted graph with web, desktop and mobile apps, and supports multiplayer shared graphs. It costs $15/month or $165/year (no free plan beyond a 31-day trial), with a $500 five-year “Believer” plan. Development has visibly slowed since its heyday — recent years brought mostly backend work rather than new features — which is worth weighing against its still-excellent core outlining model.

Obsidian vs Roam Research at a glance

Pricing and features as of mid-2026 — check each product’s site for current details.

Where Obsidian shines

• True data ownership: plain Markdown files on your disk, readable by any app, with no account required and no lock-in.
• The largest plugin ecosystem in the category — if you want a workflow, someone has probably built it.
• Free for personal and commercial use; you only pay for optional Sync or Publish.
• Bases and Canvas add database views and visual thinking without leaving your local vault.
• End-to-end encrypted sync (as a paid add-on) for the privacy-conscious.

Worth knowing: There’s no web app, and multi-device use effectively requires paid Sync or DIY setups. Collaboration is weak — shared vaults exist but there’s no real-time co-editing. Out of the box it’s fairly bare; the power comes from configuring plugins yourself, which is a hobby in its own right. Capturing web content, newsletters or feeds means assembling extensions and plugins rather than anything built in.

Where Roam Research shines

• The block-reference model remains best-in-class: reference, embed and remix any bullet anywhere, with transclusion that keeps everything in sync.
• Daily notes as the default entry point suits journaling and interstitial note-taking.
• Powerful queries and roam/js customization for advanced users.
• Multiplayer graphs allow real shared workspaces.

Worth knowing: At $15/month with no free plan, it’s among the priciest tools here. Development pace has slowed markedly, and the mobile experience lags competitors. It’s cloud-hosted and proprietary, with no local-first storage for standard graphs.

Which should you choose?

Choose Obsidian if:

• You want your notes as local files you fully control, independent of any company’s servers.
• You enjoy tinkering and want to assemble a personalized system from plugins.
• You work offline often or in environments where cloud tools are off-limits.
• You want a free tool with no note limits.

Choose Roam Research if:

• Your thinking is outline-shaped and block references are central to how you write.
• You live in daily notes and build structure bottom-up.
• You’re already invested in a Roam graph and its query workflows.

A third option: Dexi

If what you actually want is one searchable place for notes, bookmarks, newsletters and RSS — with tags, @mentions and [[wiki links]] that organize themselves as you write, semantic search that finds ideas even when the words don’t match, and an MCP server so Claude and other AI assistants can work with your notes directly — take a look at Dexi. It’s free for up to 1,000 notes, with no app to install.

• Dexi vs Obsidian
• Dexi vs Roam Research

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