Leaving Notion for Obsidian Bases → Obsidian
“I'm finally able to kill Notion (good riddance - I never liked it!),”
Obsidian alternatives: where its users went, and why they left
Obsidian (obsidian.md) has 23 sourced reports on Friction, drawn from 23 public source threads. This page reads the ones about leaving: 3 destinations named in 3 switching reports. If you are leaving Obsidian, what do its users say they moved to, and what pushed them out?
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Where Obsidian users say they went
Switching reports that name a destination. Every report quotes a real commenter and links to the thread it came from.
| Named alternative | Reports naming it | Newest report |
|---|---|---|
| Obsidian | 2 | 2025 |
| VSCode | 1 | 2024 |
In their words
Stopped using Obsidian over its editing and customization friction → VSCode
“I tried it a few times but had to stop”
Evaluating Obsidian for a better mobile experience → Obsidian
“This is frustrating enough that I'm always kinda low-key evaluating other systems, like Obsidian, that have a better story for mobile”
What pushes people away from Obsidian
Open reports about a customer's money or workflow, or that block work or cause churn: customer-side reports first, then worst severity. Each links to the item with its source. Reports about third-party add-ons and outsiders' abuse are left out.
Git plugin has erased history and notes · Reliability & bugs · Blocks work
“Obsidian's git plugin has on several occasions blown away my history and notes”
Linux file links inside vaults disappear · Reliability & bugs · Blocks work
“It also doesn't handle file links under Linux correctly. For whatever reason, any link pointing to a file inside the vault, disappears”
See all 23 reports for Obsidian
Other workspace and files tools on Friction, and what their users struggle with
Switching trades one set of problems for another. The same evidence, for each tool Friction covers in this category:
Nextcloud
38 reports · 92 source threads · most-discussed area: Reliability & bugs
- Daily cron job maxes out the CPU for about an hour after upgrading to 33
- Photo backup is not reliable enough for backups
- Updater fails when PHP iconv is disabled
Obsidian vs Nextcloud: side by side · Nextcloud alternatives
Outline
16 reports · 71 source threads · most-discussed area: UI & usability
Notion
14 reports · 25 source threads · most-discussed area: UI & usability
Every report quotes a real commenter and links to the thread it came from. How the data is built.