Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Obsidian.md VS Monkeytype

Compare Obsidian.md VS Monkeytype and see what are their differences

Obsidian.md logo Obsidian.md

A second brain, for you, forever. Obsidian is a powerful knowledge base that works on top of a local folder of plain text Markdown files.

Monkeytype logo Monkeytype

Monkeytype is a minimalistic typing test, featuring many test modes, an account system to save your typing speed history and user configurable features like themes, a smooth caret and more.
  • Obsidian.md Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-01
  • Monkeytype Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-06-17

Obsidian.md features and specs

  • Local-first
    Obsidian stores your notes locally on your device, giving you full control over your data and enhancing privacy.
  • Markdown Support
    Obsidian uses Markdown, making it easy to format text and compatible with many other text editors and tools.
  • Bidirectional Linking
    You can create bidirectional links between notes, which helps in building a knowledge graph and navigating related information more easily.
  • Customizability
    Obsidian is highly customizable with community plugins, themes, and various settings to fit different workflows.
  • Graph View
    Provides a visual graph view of your notes and their connections, aiding in understanding relationships and discovering insights.
  • Offline Access
    Since the notes are stored locally, you can access and edit them without an internet connection.

Possible disadvantages of Obsidian.md

  • Learning Curve
    Obsidian can be complex and overwhelming for beginners due to its extensive features and customizable nature.
  • Sync Limitations
    While local-first is great for privacy, it requires additional steps or third-party solutions for syncing across devices.
  • No True Real-time Collaboration
    Obsidian lacks native real-time collaboration features, making it less suitable for collaborative work compared to cloud-based solutions.
  • Limited Mobile Features
    The mobile version of Obsidian, while functional, is not as robust as the desktop application, potentially hindering productivity on the go.
  • Dependence on Plugins
    Many advanced features require the use of third-party plugins, which could lead to compatibility issues and reliance on community support.
  • Performance on Large Vaults
    Performance might degrade with a very large number of notes or complex graphs, impacting usability.

Monkeytype features and specs

  • User-friendly Interface
    Monkeytype offers a clean and simple interface that is easy to navigate, allowing users to focus on their typing practice without distractions.
  • Customizable Settings
    Users can customize various settings such as test length, themes, and text sources to tailor their typing practice to their preferences.
  • Real-time Analytics
    The platform provides real-time statistics on typing speed, accuracy, and error patterns, helping users track their progress effectively.
  • Variety of Test Modes
    Monkeytype offers multiple test modes including 10fastfingers, typeracer, custom paragraphs, and more to keep practice sessions diverse and engaging.
  • Portable Data
    Users can save their typing data and access it from any device, ensuring their progress is always up-to-date.

Possible disadvantages of Monkeytype

  • Limited Features in Free Version
    Some advanced features and customization options are only available in the premium version, potentially limiting the experience for free users.
  • Internet Dependency
    An active internet connection is required to save and access progress data, which can be inconvenient for users with unreliable connectivity.
  • No Offline Mode
    Unlike some other typing practice tools, Monkeytype does not offer an offline mode, meaning users cannot practice without an internet connection.
  • No Guided Lessons
    The platform does not provide structured typing lessons or learning paths, which may be a drawback for beginners looking for a step-by-step learning process.
  • Basic Typing Content
    The default text samples for typing practice can be repetitive and may not cater to users looking for more specialized or varied typing material.

Analysis of Obsidian.md

Overall verdict

  • Overall, Obsidian.md is an excellent tool for users looking for a versatile and powerful note-taking application. Its unique features such as backlinking, markdown support, and robust customization options make it a favorite among knowledge management enthusiasts.

Why this product is good

  • Obsidian.md is considered good by many users because it is a powerful knowledge management and note-taking application that leverages Markdown for document formatting. It allows for bi-directional linking between notes, which helps in creating a network of interconnected ideas, often described as a 'second brain.' Its ability to support plugins, themes, and robust graph visualization also adds to its appeal. Additionally, it stores notes locally, ensuring privacy and data ownership, while being cross-platform compatible across Windows, macOS, and Linux.

Recommended for

  • Knowledge workers who need a powerful tool to organize and connect their thoughts.
  • Students who are looking to create a structured and visually interconnected note system.
  • Writers and researchers who benefit from linking related ideas and maintaining detailed notes.
  • Tech-savvy users or developers who appreciate the local storage and open ecosystem for plugins and customization.

Analysis of Monkeytype

Overall verdict

  • Overall, Monkeytype is highly recommended for those looking to improve their typing skills. Its engaging and simple design, combined with robust functionality, creates an effective and enjoyable learning environment.

Why this product is good

  • Monkeytype is considered good by many users because of its minimalist interface, comprehensive customization options, and extensive language support. It focuses on providing a distraction-free typing experience with features like custom themes, various test modes, and detailed statistics to track progress. Additionally, it offers accessibility options that make it inclusive for a wide range of users.

Recommended for

  • Individuals looking to improve their typing speed and accuracy.
  • People who enjoy customizable user experiences.
  • Users who want to practice typing in different languages.
  • Educators and typing coaches seeking a tool for teaching typing skills.
  • Anyone seeking a distraction-free typing test platform.

Obsidian.md videos

OBSIDIAN: Getting Started, Facts & Pricing

Monkeytype videos

No Monkeytype videos yet. You could help us improve this page by suggesting one.

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Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Obsidian.md and Monkeytype)
Knowledge Management
100 100%
0% 0
Personal Productivity
0 0%
100% 100
Note Taking
96 96%
4% 4
Tool
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Obsidian.md and Monkeytype

Obsidian.md Reviews

  1. The kind of software that may change your life

    Perhaps you know someone who swears by Obsidian, it may seem like a cult of overly devoted people for how passionate they are, but it's not without reason

    I've been using Obsidian for over 3 years, at a point in my life when I felt I had to handle too much information and I felt like grasping water not being able to remember everything I wanted, language learning, programming, accounting, university, daily tasks. A friend recommended it to me next to Notion (of which he is a passionate cultist priest) and I reluctantly picked it and fell in love almost immediately.

    Obsidian seems very simple, like a notepad with folder interface, similar to Sublime Text, but the ability to link files together in a Wiki style allows you to organize ideas in any way you want, one file may lead to a dozen or more ideas that are related

    If you want to do something specific, Obsidian has a plethora of community created plugins that expand the functionality, in my case, I use obsidian to organize my classes both as a teacher and as a student, using local databases, calendars, dictionaries, slides, vector graphic drawings, excel-like tables, Anki connection, podcasts, and more

    ๐Ÿ Competitors: Notion, Evernote
    ๐Ÿ‘ Pros:    Awesome community|Custom plugins|Local hosting|Beautiful themes|Highly customizable|Cloud storage|Becomes more useful over time|Markdown support
    ๐Ÿ‘Ž Cons:    Seems complicated/complex at first|Takes time to set up your personal workspace|Overwhelming for first time user
  2. Stan
    ยท Founder at SaaSHub ยท
    My personal knowledge-base of choice

    I've been using Obsidian for more than a year. It's been great. I think it offer a great balance of control, flexibility and extensibility. What is more, you own your own data, that's been a must-have feature for me. I just can't imagine putting all my knowledge into something that I don't have control over.

    I think two of the most popular alternatives that people consider are Logseq and Roam Research. Although Logseq is a bit different, it's considered compatible with Obsidian. Supposedly, you can use them with a shared database (files. Both use simple text files for storage). I tried that once, a few months ago. It worked, yet it messed up a bit my Obsidian files ยฏ_(ใƒ„)_/ยฏ.

    ๐Ÿ Competitors: Logseq, Roam Research

The 6 best note-taking apps in 2024
One thing to note: Notion bills itself as an Evernote competitor for personal users. It can beโ€”but it's too much for most people, and its offline functionality isn't the best. If you love the idea of Notion, go right ahead and try the free Personal Plan, but for me, it's really best as a team notes app or an AI-powered notes app. Something like Obsidian (which we'll look at...
Source: zapier.com
The best note-taking apps for collecting your thoughts and data
This app is the kind of thing that, if youโ€™re into it, will have you exploring its various ins, outs, and add-ons for days and weeks on end. Obsidian uses the Markdown format for its notes (which means they can be used on a variety of other apps). Your notes and other media are kept locally in a Vault (in other words, a main folder). There are ways to sync between devices...
The 5 Best Open Source Miro Alternatives in 2024
However, it's important to note that Obsidian's whiteboard functionality is not as robust as dedicated collaboration tools. While it lacks real-time basic collaboration features, Obsidian compensates with its vibrant plugin ecosystem, empowering users to customize their experience.
Source: affine.pro
The best encrypted note taking apps
For a consumer coming from Evernote, Notion, OneNote, or a similar product, we would advise trying Obsidian along another product on this list as it has the largest learning curve. However, if you are an expert with markdown, experts, linking, and graph views, Obsidian could be an excellent choice. Like many other configuration options, Obsidian leaves end-to-end encryption...
Source: www.skiff.com
Supercharge Your Productivity: Three Recommended Tools for Thought
One of my AP Productivity: Cohort mentors has a powerful system pairing Obsidian with OmniFocus. In OmniFocus, he builds his project and task structures, and in Obsidian he develops and organizes the project support materials as well as other relevant information. Because itโ€™s easy to link to an Obsidian note or an OmniFocus project, he can seamlessly navigate back and forth...
Source: medium.com

Monkeytype Reviews

We have no reviews of Monkeytype yet.
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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Obsidian.md should be more popular than Monkeytype. It has been mentiond 1520 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Obsidian.md mentions (1520)

  • Bringing Notes, WeChat Reading, and Zhihu into Obsidian: My LLM-Wiki Knowledge Hub
    Install Obsidian: Download the client from obsidian.md and create a local Vault โ€” just a local folder. - Source: dev.to / 19 days ago
  • Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?
    Obsidian (https://obsidian.md/) Honestly its not huge and most are probably obvious, but those are what I immediately install on my machines. - Source: Hacker News / 22 days ago
  • Turning Kiro Into a Leadership Coach With Meeting Transcripts
    A place to store the feedback - I keep mine in an Obsidian vault, organised by type (interviewing, facilitation) and date. This makes trend tracking trivial. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • Best Markdown Editors for Developers
    Option 2: Dedicated markdown app.Typora, Obsidian, or similar. Better editing experience, but now you're context-switching between your code editor and your docs editor. Copy-pasting paths, losing mental context, duplicating effort. - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • How to build a second brain with Obsidian and Claude Code (step by step)
    Obsidian is the storage. A desktop app that opens any folder of markdown files and adds links, search, and a graph view on top. Your files stay on your disk. No cloud unless you turn it on, no proprietary database, no export step. If you want your notes back, you already have them. - Source: dev.to / about 2 months ago
View more

Monkeytype mentions (227)

  • Mouseless โ€“ keyboard-driven control of macOS/Linux/Windows
    I'm astonished by how far those aim trainer tools go haha, and how popular they are. I discovered Aimlabs[1] recently, which seems like the most popular one, and it has 6 000 people playing right now. For us keyboard geeks, there is monkeytype: https://monkeytype.com/ [1] https://store.steampowered.com/app/714010/Aimlabs/. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 month ago
  • I got tired of re-screenshotting my app every time I made a change . So I built a workflow that does it for me.
    My app's theme engine (powered by Monkeytype) supports 190 themes. I'm working towards making the website available in all of them, which means every screenshot on every feature page needs a variant per theme. That's 50 screenshots across 13 features. At 190 themes, that's 9,500 screenshots total. And that number grows with every new feature and every new theme added. - Source: dev.to / 3 months ago
  • A Beginner's Guide to Split Keyboards
    I'm in the same boat as OP. I've used keybr and https://monkeytype.com/, and while doing the exercises, I get pretty close to the speed and accuracy I had using a standard keyboard and qwerty, but I get much worse on both fronts when typing in the real world. - Source: Hacker News / 5 months ago
  • How I Grew My Open-Source Japanese Learning Platform to 10k Monthly Users and 640+ GitHub Stars (as a Solo Dev and Student)
    When I first started building KanaDojo, I wasnโ€™t planning to build a serious learning platform or anything like that. I just wanted a simple, beautiful, free way to practice and learn the Japanese kana (which is essentially the Japanese alphabet, though it's more accurately described as a syllabary) - something that felt as clean and addictive as Monkeytype, but for language learners. - Source: dev.to / 8 months ago
  • Fingerjigger
    Typing speed tests are always fun. I enjoy https://monkeytype.com/. - Source: Hacker News / 11 months ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Obsidian.md and Monkeytype, you can also consider the following products

Notion - All-in-one workspace. One tool for your whole team. Write, plan, and get organized.

keybr - This website teaches touch typing via lessons that feature letters and spaces on the user's screen. During each lesson, a cursor highlights the letter or space that the user must type... read more.

Logseq - Logseq is a local-first, non-linear, outliner notebook for organizing and sharing your personal knowledge base.

Typing.com - Learn & Teach Typing, Free! Perfect for all ages & levels, K-12 and beyond.

Joplin - Joplin is a free, open source note taking and to-do application, which can handle a large number of notes organised into notebooks. The notes are searchable, tagged and modified either from the applications directly or from your own text editor.

10FastFingers.com - Improve your Typing Speed with our Typing Games