# Obsidian

Obsidian (obsidian.md) is a local-first markdown editor and PKM (personal knowledge management) tool. Files are stored as plain `.md` on disk; wikilinks (`[[page]]`), embeds (`![[page]]`), and YAML frontmatter (Properties) are first-class. The app is closed-source but free for personal use; revenue is from optional Sync / Publish subscriptions and a small commercial-use license.

The plugin and theme ecosystem is the differentiator. The [Obsidian API](https://docs.obsidian.md/) shipped in 2020; by 2026 the community has produced over 4,000 plugins and themes, with cumulative downloads past 120 million. Plugins are TypeScript modules that mount into Obsidian's editor, view, and command surface — table-of-contents generators, Excalidraw integration, Dataview queries over frontmatter, Templater scripting, dozens of AI assistants, custom property types ([[obsidian-bases]]), and so on.

The Second Brain itself is an Obsidian vault — every wiki page renders correctly when opened in Obsidian, [[llm-wiki-pattern]] explicitly assumes Obsidian conventions, and the `CLAUDE.md` schema is constrained to "Obsidian Flavored Markdown" so the human reader can use Obsidian's graph view and backlinks freely.

## Plugin distribution and review (2026 reset)

In May 2026 Obsidian launched the [Obsidian Community](https://community.obsidian.md/) directory — see [[obsidian-future-of-plugins]] — replacing the GitHub-PR submission model with a developer dashboard and an automated review system that scans *every* release, not only the first. Manual review is preserved for popular / featured / flagged plugins. Roadmap items: per-plugin capability disclosures (network, filesystem, clipboard), verified-author labels, support for team-private plugins.

## Related pages

- [[obsidian-future-of-plugins]] — summary of the May 2026 Community-site / automated-review launch
- [[obsidian-ai-complete-guide]] — Huashu's production implementation of the LLM Wiki pattern on top of Obsidian
- [[obsidian-bases]] — the built-in database views this vault's dashboards are built on
- `obsidian-markdown` and `obsidian-cli` — Claude Code skills inside this vault, not pages
- [[llm-wiki-pattern]] — the wiki pattern these pages all serve
- [[toolbox/quartz]] — static site generator that publishes an Obsidian vault as a digital garden