Initial Thoughts on Obsidian
Over the years I’ve used a variety of different note taking apps and systems:
- 2008: During college I took mainly handwritten notes. I used Apple Notes for casual snippets
- 2012: Mostly kept Markdown notes in a directory
- 2016: Switched from iOS to Android and used Google Keep for notes
- 2020: Moved to Notion
- 2022-present: I’ve been using Apple Notes as my primary note taking platform.
This year, based on a tip from a coworker, I started checking out Obsidian and trialing it for taking notes, writing, and planning various things. I’ve been enjoying it so far – it feels like building my own personal Wikipedia. Here are some additional thoughts.
Obsidian vs. Apple notes
The main reason I adopted Apple Notes most recently is because I value the snappiness of Apple’s native Cocoa apps and the various OS integration points it offers. That said, the Obsidian developers must also really care about usability and UI snappiness because their mobile and desktop apps are also quite fast, achieving near-native performance. Notion, on the other hand, sometimes felt like a web app with some jank here and there.
One thing I still use Apple notes for is shared notes and super quick scribbled notes (since you can open a new note from anywhere on iOS via the control panel bar).
Obsidian vs. Notion
Notion is the second platform I have the most recent experience with. Notion feels very organization-focused, whereas Obsidian seems targeted towards “Personal” knowledge management. Obsidian feels like it’s more for power users who know what markdown is, whereas Notion could be used by anyone in an organization. I still use Notion for its tables – to manage things like my vacation packing list – since it allows complex views of the same data and provide just the right UI. I know Obsidian has bases, but Notion is better for managing this when I’m frantically trying to run around and pack my luggage.
Going Forward
I’m excited to continue building my “personal Wikipedia” in Obsidian. I just started using it to track my books and reading progress, given the continued degradation of Goodreads.
Through the Obsidian educational content I’ve been consuming (here’s a good video btw), I came across the book How to Take Smart Notes, which has been a fantastic read so far. It completely changed the way I think about writing. I really wish I had this type of book in college.