Obsidian vs Notion vs plain text files for notes and knowledge management in 2026. What are people actually using - for 2026

[IronFist38]

I have tried Notion and find it too heavy and slow. I have heard good things about Obsidian. I also know some people just use plain text files with good folder structure. What do people here actually use and what made you stick with it?

Main use case is technical notes, ideas, and reference material

[WWEPete45]

Obsidian for technical notes and reference. The local first approach means your notes are just markdown files you own, the graph view is useful for seeing connections between ideas, and the plugin ecosystem is extensive

[Aura49]

Plain text with a good folder structure and a fast search tool like ripgrep is more resilient than any note app. The notes outlast every application ever written. Worth considering if you want something that will work in 20 years

[Vanessa26]

Notion is powerful but the sync lag and the fact that your data lives on their servers bothers some people. The offline experience is also worse than Obsidian

[Hollow85]

The switching cost from any note system is underestimated. Pick something and commit for a year before deciding it is wrong. Most note system failures are commitment failures not tool failures

[HitmanMatt53]

Obsidian with the Dataview plugin turns your notes into a queryable database. For technical reference material that capability becomes very useful once your note collection grows

[GlassKnight89]

For technical notes specifically I would add that Obsidian handles code blocks properly with syntax highlighting, which Notion does passably and plain text apps often do not

[Sharp Shannon]

Logseq is worth mentioning as a fully open source Obsidian alternative with an outliner-first approach. If the Obsidian proprietary app bothers you even though the files are open format, Logseq is the alternative