1In short
Morion is a local notebook and task board built for coding agents. Claude Code, Codex, Cursor and other clients connect with one click, any MCP client connects by config, and agents see only the folders you allow. Mo finds the notes a question needs when it is asked and answers with the source note and a status on every claim. The board is a queue agents claim tickets from, and Auto-code runs a ticket through a workflow of agents.
Obsidian is a local notebook of Markdown files with thousands of plugins, mobile apps and sync; the app is free, Sync and Publish are paid. It ships no AI of its own: the official agent route is a CLI that needs the desktop app running, and MCP comes only from community plugins and servers, such as Local REST API, with access to the whole vault.
Pick Morion when the notes are a project that several agents work on. Keep Obsidian for a personal knowledge base with the largest plugin ecosystem, mobile and sync.
2Agents in a vault today
“Claude Code in my Obsidian vault” is a common setup this year. Getting there takes several pieces, each chosen and maintained by you:
- Access. The official CLI works only while the desktop app is running. MCP comes from community servers, dozens of them, with different tools and security records.
- Permissions. A server or plugin sees the whole vault. Obsidian’s own help says it cannot reliably restrict plugins to specific permissions. In April a malware campaign abused two community plugins in shared vaults to run code (Elastic Security Labs).
- Search and memory. Core search matches text. Semantic search, summaries and a structure the agent can navigate come from more plugins, or from a CLAUDE.md and a routine you write by hand.
- Work. The kanban is a view grouped by a property. There is no claim, no ticket history an agent writes to, and no runner that takes a card to a merge.
3Side by side
| Obsidian | Morion | |
|---|---|---|
| Local Markdown notes | ||
| Notes as plain files in a folder | ||
| Official MCP server | — | |
| Folder and per-note permissions for agents | — | |
| Semantic search built in | — | |
| Context from your notes, picked for each task | — | |
| Answers that cite the note, with a status | — | |
| Kanban board | ||
| Tickets agents claim, with work packets | — | |
| Workflow runner with a human gate | — | |
| Plugin ecosystem | — | |
| Mobile app and sync | — | |
| App free with no limits |
has it, has part of it, — does not. Obsidian without community plugins, as of September 2026 (version 1.14): its changelog and help list a CLI and no MCP server; plugins add MCP, semantic search and in-app agents, each with access to the whole vault. Morion keeps notes in one local file and exports them as .md. Morion’s Free plan has notes, the board and a monthly allowance of MCP calls; Morion has no mobile app or sync yet. Obsidian’s app is free with no limits; Sync, Publish and the commercial license are paid.
4An LLM wiki you do not maintain
A widely shared Obsidian idea this year is Karpathy’s “LLM wiki”: instead of re-reading raw files on every question, the model maintains a wiki that compiles them, and a loop keeps it honest. In Obsidian you build it yourself: a schema in CLAUDE.md, a folder layout, prompts that update pages, and a routine you run.
In Morion there is no wiki to keep up. When you or an agent ask, Mo searches the folders you allow, picks the notes that matter and answers with the source and a status on each claim, so an outdated page shows up as superseded instead of being repeated. Need an overview of a folder or a project? Mo writes one on request, with citations, from the notes as they are that day.
Mo’s AI is included in Pro, with no key to set up. More on how it works: Smart retrieval and the LLM wiki use case.
5Which one fits you
if the vault is your personal knowledge base, you want notes on your phone, and you enjoy building the setup from plugins.
if the notes belong to a project that Claude Code, Codex or Cursor work on every day, and you want agents to see only the folders you allow, find the right note without a hand-written map, and take tickets from a board.
if you keep reading notes and journals in Obsidian and move project work into Morion. Import the folders you want as .md files; the vault stays as it is.
6Moving a vault over
Create a project in Morion, import the vault folders you want as .md files, and connect your agents in Settings → Integrations → Apps and Agents. Set which folders agents may see, create in and edit; hide the rest. Turn on AI access for the project folders, and Mo can answer from them.
Your CLAUDE.md can then shrink to rules. The walk-through: From CLAUDE.md to a memory that cites.
7Questions
No. Obsidian ships an official CLI, which needs the desktop app running. MCP comes from community projects such as the Local REST API plugin, which has an MCP endpoint, and mcp-obsidian.
Yes. The vault is a folder of Markdown files, so an agent can read it directly or through a community MCP server. Either way it sees the whole vault; Obsidian has no per-folder permissions for agents.
Notes are Markdown, edited in a WYSIWYG editor and stored in one local file. Import and export .md files at any time.
Not yet. Morion is a desktop app for macOS, Windows and Linux. If you need notes on your phone today, Obsidian has it.
Yes, since version 1.14 in September 2026: a kanban layout in Bases that groups notes by a property. It is a view; agents do not claim cards from it, and it keeps no ticket history.
Sources: obsidian.md (pricing, changelog, help on the CLI, Bases and plugin security), the community MCP server repositories, Elastic Security Labs on the plugin malware campaign, checked on 25 September 2026. See also Notion alternative and Logseq vs Obsidian.