An Obsidian alternative with tasks and capture built in, and the AI you choose

If you like the idea behind Obsidian, notes that live on your own computer and link to each other, but want less to set up, Barside is a free Obsidian alternative for Windows, Linux and Mac. You get [[ links, backlinks and a note map, plus a task board, reminders, templates, a reading inbox, screen recording, call transcription and AI that uses your own account. It all comes in the box: there is no plugin list to work through, and no account for your notes.

Barside is not a Markdown editor, and that is the biggest difference between the two. This page is honest about it, compares the apps feature by feature, and shows how to bring a vault across in a few minutes.

The short answer

Obsidian is excellent at what it promises. It is free, needs no sign-up, and does not require a paid license for work. It stores notes as plain Markdown files in a folder you own, so any editor can open them. It runs on Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS and Android, and thousands of community plugins and themes let you shape it into almost anything. Core features such as Canvas, Graph view and Bases cover a lot on their own.

People look for an Obsidian alternative when they would rather use a system than build one. Barside's answer:

• Built in, not assembled. A task board, due dates, reminders, daily notes, templates and a search bar work the moment you install the app, and a calendar is one private iCal link away.
• A document editor. Notes have a toolbar with fonts, colors, highlights, tables and checklists, and there is no syntax to learn.
• One app for the whole day. Reading, recording, transcription, meetings and your own AI sit next to your notes.
• Still local-first. Your library lives on your computer and works offline, with no account.

If your notes must stay plain files that any app can open, stay with Obsidian. If you want linked notes plus everything around them, ready to use, read on.

Why people look for an Obsidian alternative

These are the reasons that come up most, stated fairly. The facts about Obsidian come from its own website and help pages, as of September 2026.

• A setup to build. Obsidian's core covers notes, links, the graph, Canvas and Bases. Much of the rest comes from community plugins: Obsidian's directory lists more than 8,000 of them, with task, kanban, calendar and AI plugins among them. Each one is another thing to choose, configure and keep up to date.
• Sync costs extra, or takes work. Sync Standard costs US$4 a month billed yearly (US$5 monthly) for 1 vault, 1 GB and files up to 5 MB. Sync Plus costs US$8 (US$10 monthly) for 10 vaults and 10 GB. Free routes exist, but Obsidian's own help lists their caveats: iCloud Drive on Windows may lead to duplicated or corrupted files, and OneDrive and Google Drive are not officially supported for vaults on iOS.
• Markdown underneath. Live Preview hides most of the syntax, but when your cursor enters formatted text, the Markdown shows again. Some people want a document editor with buttons instead.
• Other tools mean other apps. Reminders that alert you, a reading inbox with newsletters, screen recording, call transcripts and video meetings are not part of Obsidian's core plugins.
• AI through plugins. AI in Obsidian comes from community plugins, each with its own setup, its own settings and its own way of handling your notes.

Barside at a glance

Barside keeps linked notes, the idea at the heart of Obsidian, and builds them into a full desktop app.

• Links that keep up. Type [[ in a note and pick a note, or choose Create note to make a new one. A link always shows the current title, even after you rename the note, and a link to a deleted note turns gray and is crossed out. See linked notes and backlinks.
• Backlinks with context. Under each note, Linked from lists every note that links to it, with the sentence that holds the link.
• A note map. The Note map draws notes as dots and links as lines. Drag to move, scroll to zoom, click a dot to open the note, show one workspace, find a note, or include notes without links. Very large libraries show the 800 most linked notes. See the note graph view.
• Tasks from your checklists. Every checklist item in every note appears on the Tasks board, from Overdue to No due date. Hover an item and choose + date to schedule it without leaving the note. See the task board built from your checklists.
• Daily notes that make themselves. Six ready-made templates include Daily journal and Weekly review, and Templates & repeating notes in Settings creates a note on a schedule. If Barside was not running at that time, it creates the latest missed note when it starts, never a pile of them. See note templates and repeating notes.
• Drawings in the note. The full Excalidraw editor opens from Insert a drawing, and text in drawings is searchable. See Excalidraw drawings in notes.
• Search from anywhere. Alt+Shift+Space opens the search bar over any app and finds notes, tasks, bookmarks, meetings, drawings and commands. On a Linux desktop that uses Wayland, you set it once as a shortcut in the desktop's keyboard settings; Hotkeys and aliases gives you the command. See the search bar and hotkeys.

Notes are organized in workspaces, each with its own color that its notes and tabs share, and there is no limit on notes or workspaces.

Obsidian vs Barside: feature comparison

Both apps keep notes on your device and work offline with no account. The difference is what a note is made of, and what comes with the app.

Pricing compared

Prices are as each company's own page shows them, as of September 2026.

On one computer, both apps cost nothing. The price appears when you want your notes on more than one device. Obsidian Sync starts at US$48 a year and reaches your phone too. Barside's cloud sync comes with Barside Plus at US$200 a year, which also includes encrypted daily backups and cloud agents, but covers computers only, because Barside has no phone app. Obsidian also gives students, faculty and nonprofit staff 40% off Sync and Publish.

Where Obsidian is better

Obsidian does several things Barside does not try to do. If any of these matter to you, stay with Obsidian.

• Plain files you own. Obsidian's notes are Markdown files in a folder, so any editor, script or version control tool can work with them, and Obsidian picks up changes made outside it. Barside keeps its library in its own format; you can export the whole library as a ZIP backup that Barside restores, but not as Markdown files.
• Every device. Obsidian runs on Mac, iOS and Android as well as Windows and Linux. Barside runs on Windows, Linux computers and Mac.
• Plugins, themes and a developer API. More than 8,000 community plugins and 800 themes let you tailor Obsidian to your own workflow, and its developer docs show how to build your own. Barside has no plugins.
• End-to-end encrypted sync. Obsidian Sync encrypts your notes with AES-256 so Obsidian cannot read them. Barside's cloud sync is encrypted in transit and at rest but is not end-to-end encrypted. Barside's cloud backup is encrypted on your computer before upload, so only you can open it.
• More structure. Nested folders, tags, properties, Bases views, Canvas, embeds of one note inside another, and backlinks that also find unlinked mentions. Barside has one level of workspaces and plain links.
• History. File recovery keeps snapshots on your device, and Sync keeps version history for every note. Barside has no per-note history.
• Publishing and shared vaults. Obsidian Publish turns notes into a website, and Sync can share a vault with your team. Barside shares copies of notes into a Space, where members talk them over in the chat and owners and moderators pin the messages that matter.

What you gain with Barside

• Reading, built in. Save articles with Save or Save the page open in your browser, get newsletters at your own Barside email address (with a free Barside sign-in), highlight text with comments, and press Listen to hear an article read aloud with your computer's voices, at 0.8× to 2× speed. See the read-it-later app with highlights.
• Capture on your computer. Record a screen, a window or audio into a note, with a webcam bubble and trimming. Transcribe calls with speech-to-text that runs on your computer, labeled You and Others. Alt+Shift+S copies text from any part of the screen. See call transcription and copy text from the screen.
• Answers from your notes. Ask library in Library & briefing searches your notes, Reading, bookmarks and transcripts on your computer, and the AI you connected writes an answer that cites each source. See AI search that cites its sources.
• Your own AI, one click away. Settings → AI connects Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini or OpenRouter. The assistant (Ctrl+Shift+A) can add tasks and set reminders, and agents put their work in an approval inbox. Add to Claude Desktop connects Claude Desktop in one click, and More apps and options lets you choose which workspaces each AI app may use. Barside has no AI model of its own.
• Reminders that ring. Press the bell on a note, pick a time and a sound, a silent alert or the note opening, and snooze for ten minutes when you need to. See reminders on notes.
• A desktop app first. Dock notes to any edge of any monitor and keep the desktop bar with your workspaces along one edge of the screen. See the native desktop app. Switch to Reader Mode or Writer Mode to see only the tools you use, with app modes.

How to move from Obsidian to Barside

An Obsidian vault is already a folder of Markdown files, so there is nothing to export. Barside copies what it imports and leaves your vault untouched, so you can keep using Obsidian while you decide.

1. In Barside, open Settings & backups, find Notes from other apps and choose Import next to Import notes. You can also type import in the search bar.
2. Choose Obsidian, then Choose vault folder, and pick the vault's main folder. Its subfolders come along.
3. Read the preview under Ready to import: how many notes and attachments Barside found, the first titles, and the things to know about anything it skipped.
4. Under Import into, keep A new workspace, which Barside names From Obsidian, and choose Import.
5. When Your notes are here. appears, choose Open workspace, then open the Note map to see your links drawn again.

What comes across:

• Links. [[Wiki links]], links with their own label like [[Project plan|the plan]], heading links like [[Beta#Risks]] and ordinary Markdown links between notes all become Barside note links.
• Embeds. Embedded images such as ![[diagram.png]] show in the note, audio and video play in it, and an embedded note becomes a link to that note.
• Checklists. Lines like - [ ] and - [x] become checklists, ticked or not, and they appear on the Tasks board.
• Front matter. The title, tags, created and updated properties give the note its title, tags and dates.
• The rest of the Markdown. Headings, tables, code, quotes and nested lists keep their shape.

What changes:

• Folders flatten. The whole vault goes into the one workspace you choose. To keep areas apart, import once and then move notes into workspaces, since a link only resolves to a note in the same import.
• Tags become text. Each note that had tags ends with a bold Tags: line, so search still finds them.
• Some files stay behind. PDFs and other attachments are not imported: each leaves a line saying Attachment not imported with its name. Canvas and Bases files, plugin settings, the .obsidian folder and the .trash folder are left out, and plugin code such as a Dataview query arrives as a code block, not as its results.
• Limits. One import reads up to 5,000 notes, up to 20,000 files and up to 1 GB, with attachments up to 200 MB each.

The full walkthrough is in the guide to import notes from Notion, Evernote and Obsidian.

Who should switch, and who should stay

Barside is a good fit if you:

• want linked notes without choosing and maintaining plugins;
• work on a Windows or Linux computer and want everything offline;
• want tasks, reminders, reading, recording and AI in the same app as your notes;
• prefer a document editor with a toolbar to writing Markdown.

Stay with Obsidian if you:

• need your notes as plain Markdown files that other tools can open;
• rely on community plugins, Bases or Canvas;
• need your notes on a phone, or on a Mac;
• want end-to-end encrypted sync, or want to publish your notes as a site.

Privacy: where your notes live

Both apps are local-first. Barside keeps notes, media and settings in its data folder on your computer. It counts which features are used, by name only, and you can turn that off. None of your content leaves your computer unless you use an online feature on purpose, such as sharing a note to a Space, a share link, or cloud backup and sync with Barside Plus. AI features send only what a request needs to the AI company you connected, and you can leave any workspace or note out of Library AI. See the privacy guide and local-first storage with private backups.

Other Obsidian alternatives worth a look

• Logseq. A privacy-first, open-source knowledge base with task management and PDF annotation, with desktop apps for Windows, macOS and Linux and mobile apps too. Its file-based version stores notes as Markdown or Org-mode files; Logseq 2.0, built on a database, is in beta.
• Joplin. A free, open-source notes app with Rich Text and Markdown editors, end-to-end encrypted sync through Joplin Cloud, Dropbox or OneDrive, and apps for every major system.
• Anytype. An offline-first app whose vault lives on your device, encrypted with keys only you hold, with table, kanban and gallery views.
• Notion, if you want a shared online workspace more than local files. See the Notion alternative guide.

For the wider field, see the best second brain apps and the best local-first apps.

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