Coffee vs Obsidian: which Markdown app for your Mac?

Checked November 2026 against Obsidian's pricing page and help. I make Coffee, so read this with that in mind. Coffee isn't affiliated with Obsidian.

If you need plugins, a graph of linked notes, or anything beyond a Mac, choose Obsidian. It's also free, which Coffee isn't. Choose Coffee if you work only on a Mac and want a focused editor where reviewing AI edits, sums in your notes and PDF templates are already there, with nothing to configure.

Both keep your notes as plain Markdown files, so this isn't a choice you're stuck with. You can try one on a copy of your notes and move on.

At a glance

Compared	Obsidian	Coffee
Price	Free, with paid add-ons	€3 a month, €29 a year, or €79 once
Trial	Not needed	14 days, no card
Platforms	Mac, Windows, Linux, iOS, Android	Mac only, macOS 15 or later
Your notes	Markdown files in a local folder	Markdown files in a local folder
Plugins	Thousands, plus themes	None
Sync	Sync service, from $4 a month billed yearly	None of its own. Use iCloud Drive or similar
Publishing	Publish service, from $8 a month billed yearly	None. Export to PDF, HTML, Word or EPUB
Working with others	Shared vaults through Sync. No live editing of one file yet	No collaborative editing. A change from someone else arrives through Git or a synced folder

Where Obsidian is better

Plugins. This is the big one. If you can describe a workflow, somebody has probably built it. Calendar, Kanban, Dataview, Tasks: Obsidian becomes the tool you need. Coffee has no plugins and no plans I can promise you.

Platforms. Obsidian runs on Mac, Windows, Linux, iPhone, iPad and Android. Coffee runs on a Mac and nothing else. If your notes need to be in your pocket, that settles it.

Price. The app is free without limits. You pay only for Sync or Publish, if you want them. Using it at work doesn't require a licence either, though Obsidian offers an optional commercial one.

Linked thinking. Obsidian's graph and canvas are built for seeing how ideas connect. Coffee lets you link notes with [[double brackets]], but that's where it stops. It has no graph and no canvas.

Sync that's built for it. Obsidian Sync is end-to-end encrypted, with version history, and it reaches your phone. Coffee doesn't sync at all.

Maturity and community. Obsidian has a large community writing guides, themes and answers, and Coffee is new.

Where Coffee is different

Some of these exist as Obsidian community plugins. I haven't tested those, so I'm not claiming they're worse, only that in Coffee these parts come with the app and work the same on every Mac.

Reviewing edits from outside. When Claude, Cursor or anything else edits a file, Coffee shows each change since you last read the note, to keep or undo one at a time. See how to review AI edits.

Sums in your notes. Write $30 in EUR or Tokyo time and the answer appears beside the line. Try it here.

PDFs with templates. Three templates, a title page and page numbers, with no setup. Obsidian's PDF export gives you page sizes and margins, plus CSS snippets for styling, and its help page doesn't mention page numbers. See the PDF guide.

Propose a change. In a Git repository, Coffee can send one note to a new branch and open a pull request, for people who'd rather not learn Git.

On-device questions. On macOS 26 with Apple Intelligence, you can ask about your notes, with the model running on your Mac.

Built for the Mac. Coffee is written natively for macOS, and each file you open from Finder gets its own window. Private notes lock with Touch ID, and there's a searchable, encrypted clipboard history.

Nothing to set up. This is a preference more than a feature. Some people enjoy shaping their tools, and Obsidian rewards that. Others want to start typing. Coffee is for the second group, and it won't let you change very much.

Moving between them

Since both use plain files, you don't have to convert anything. Obsidian's help explains moving Markdown into a vault, which is just dragging files in or moving them to the folder. To try Coffee on a vault, make a copy of the folder and point Coffee at it. Plain Markdown, tags in front matter and [[links]] carry over. Anything that depends on an Obsidian plugin, such as a Dataview query, is just text to Coffee.

Choose Obsidian if

You need Windows, Linux, iPhone, iPad or Android
You want plugins, or you enjoy building your own system
You think in links and want a graph or canvas
You want built-in sync, or want to publish your notes as a site
You don't want to pay for an editor

Choose Coffee if

You work on a Mac running macOS 15 or later, and that's enough
You edit Markdown with AI tools and want to check each change
You want sums, PDF templates and on-device search ready from the start, without choosing plugins
You're happy to pay a small amount for an app with fewer decisions in it

Questions

Is Obsidian free?

Yes. Obsidian's pricing page calls it free without limits, with no sign-up. Sync and Publish are optional paid services, and commercial use doesn't require a licence, though one is available.

Can Coffee open my Obsidian vault?

It can open the folder, since a vault is a folder of Markdown files. Try it on a copy first. Anything that relies on an Obsidian plugin will appear as plain text in Coffee.

Does Coffee have plugins?

No. Coffee has no plugin system.