Software Alternatives & Reviews

Obsidian.md VS Zotero

Compare Obsidian.md VS Zotero 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.

Zotero logo Zotero

Zotero is a free, easy-to-use tool to help you collect, organize, cite, and share research.
  • Obsidian.md Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-01
  • Zotero Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-09-24

Obsidian.md videos

OBSIDIAN: Getting Started, Facts & Pricing

Zotero videos

Zotero vs Mendeley: which one is best?

More videos:

  • Review - Using Zotero for academic writing

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Obsidian.md and Zotero)
Knowledge Management
100 100%
0% 0
Research Tools
0 0%
100% 100
Note Taking
100 100%
0% 0
Information Organization
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 Zotero

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

    🏁 Competitors: Notion, Evernote
    👍 Pros:    Awesome community|Custom plugins|Local hosting|Beautiful themes|Highly customizable|Cloud storage|Becomes more useful over time|Markdown support
    👎 Cons:    Seems complicated/complex at first|Takes time to set up your personal workspace|Overwhelming for first time user
  2. 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 ¯_(ツ)_/¯.

    🏁 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 be—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 you’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 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 it’s easy to link to an Obsidian note or an OmniFocus project, he can seamlessly navigate back and forth...
Source: medium.com
Logseq vs Roam Research vs Obsidian: which one should you choose?
Block Reference and block embeds: Adding block reference and block embeds in Logseq is simple. You use double-open parentheses (( and type to search the block you want to link. In Obsidian, you have to first add the link to the note and then use # to embed headers and ^ to embed blocks.– Obsidian also makes it hard to see the origin of block references, as they are only...
Source: medium.com

Zotero Reviews

Top 5 Free Reference Management Software for Research
Zotero is the only software that automatically senses research on the web. Need an article from JSTOR or a preprint from arXiv.org? A news story from the New York Times or a book from a library? Zotero has you covered, everywhere.
10 Best Reference Management Software for Research
Zotero is a reference management software that can be used by students and researchers of all levels. It’s a great way to keep track of your sources, as well as easily create citations and bibliographies. Here are some of the ways Zotero can be especially helpful for Ph.D. students:
Citation Management Tools - Alternatives to EndNote
Mendeley is a free Web-based tool similar to Zotero, but it sets itself apart with a robust PDF annotating tool. Because Mendeley doesn't work within Google Docs, you would have to create a bibliography and copy it over to the document. Thus, Mendeley might be a great fit for those who use citation managers for personal projects but not for those participating in a lot of...

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Obsidian.md seems to be a lot more popular than Zotero. While we know about 1454 links to Obsidian.md, we've tracked only 17 mentions of Zotero. 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 (1454)

  • UX Case Study: Markdown Heading
    The closest editor that follows our first principle is Obsidian editor:. - Source: dev.to / 12 days ago
  • I switched from Notion to Obsidian
    The solution was already installed on both my computer and my phone: Obsidian. - Source: dev.to / 16 days ago
  • Why single vendor is the new proprietary
    > why does open source need to "win" Open source does not need to win. But your ability to be in control of your computer needs to be preserved. A proprietary fridge cannot control your diet, while a proprietary App Store can control what software you install on YOUR phone (unless you live in EU, hello DMA!). The tail wags the dog, so to speak. Proprietary software has also been shown to break user workflows or... - Source: Hacker News / 20 days ago
  • Replatforming from Gatsby to Zola!
    So I've had my fair share of personal websites and blogs. I have built them on stacks ranging from the most basic HTML and CSS, to hosted frameworks like Wordpress and Laravel, to the more modern single page applications built in Vue and React. For a simple content blog I think you can't go wrong with a Static Site Generator though. These days I am almost exclusively writing everything in Obsidian. Which is great... - Source: dev.to / about 1 month ago
  • Show HN: Godspeed is a fast, 100% keyboard oriented todo app for Mac
    Consider making an Obsidian[^1] plugin, or writing to Obsidian-compatible Markdown files :) [^1]: https://obsidian.md/. - Source: Hacker News / about 2 months ago
View more

Zotero mentions (17)

  • Newbie help setting up Zotero using existing materials
    If the second, then you need to create a zotero group library. This can only be done at zotero.org but syncs with your client. Source: 11 months ago
  • Problems with syncing
    When I check the API settings on zotero.org, I only see my desktop actually connecting,. Source: 11 months ago
  • Emacs, a maximalist approach to social media addiction
    An approach of digital maximalism should also let you organise incoming and outgoing information (on software that you run and control). This is what [Emacs](https://emacs.org) is doing. If you're missing _e.g._ the adrenaline of social media, Emacs can help for that by letting you insert academic references into lengthy, inflammatory, but informed, nuanced, and articulated Org-mode documents. It's actually much... Source: about 1 year ago
  • Best resources for chiropractic research?
    If you’re interested in actually downloading, reading, and collecting research papers, I highly recommend Zotero. Source: about 1 year ago
  • Zotero on Chromebook
    Has anyone managed to make Zotero work on their Chromebook? I have a Lenovo Chromebook and I've not been able to make it work. I can't access any of the PDF attachments on zotero.org or install the programme. I would appreciate any suggestions you may have. Source: over 1 year ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

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

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.

Mendeley - Easily organize your papers, read & annotate your PDFs, collaborate in private or open groups, and securely access your research from everywhere.

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

JabRef - Graphical Java application for managing bibtex (. bib) databases.‎JabRef · ‎JabRef Help · ‎JabRef | Blog · ‎OpenOffice/LibreOffice .

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

Qiqqa - Qiqqa is a free research and reference management software. It can be used in many organizational projects from the academic to the personal to the business endeavor. Read more about Qiqqa.