Obsidian Pricing in 2026: What the Free App Actually Costs
The short version: Obsidian is free. The desktop and mobile apps cost nothing, have no feature limits, no ads, no account requirement, and since early 2025 they are free for commercial use too. Your notes are plain Markdown files stored locally, so the core product you download is the whole product.
What people are really asking when they search “Obsidian pricing” is which paid add-ons are worth it. There are only a few: Sync, Publish, an optional Catalyst donation, and an optional Commercial license. This page walks through each one and who actually needs it. All figures below are current as of July 2026 and pulled from Obsidian’s pricing page — prices change, so confirm there before you buy.
Obsidian pricing at a glance
| What | Price | Billing | Required? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Obsidian app (desktop + mobile) | Free | — | Core product, no cost |
| Obsidian Sync Standard | $4/user/mo annually, $5/user/mo monthly | Monthly or annual | Optional add-on |
| Obsidian Sync Plus | $8/user/mo annually (monthly higher) | Monthly or annual | Optional add-on |
| Obsidian Publish | $8/site/mo annually, $10/site/mo monthly | Monthly or annual | Optional add-on |
| Catalyst | $25 / $50 / $100+ one-time | One-time donation | Optional, unlocks no features |
| Commercial license | $50/user/year | Annual | Optional since Feb 2025 |
Students, faculty, and nonprofit staff get 40% off Sync and Publish.
Obsidian Sync: the one add-on most people consider
Sync is the official, end-to-end encrypted way to keep the same vault current across your laptop, phone, and tablet. It is the paid feature the largest share of users actually buy.
There are two tiers. Sync Standard is $4 per month billed annually or $5 per month billed monthly, and includes 1 GB of storage, one month of version history, and one synced vault. Sync Plus is $8 per month billed annually and includes 10 GB of storage (expandable to 100 GB for $16/month annually), twelve months of version history, and up to ten synced vaults. Both are per user.
You do not have to pay for Sync at all. Because your vault is just a folder of Markdown files, plenty of people sync for free by dropping the folder in iCloud Drive, Dropbox, or OneDrive, or by pushing it to a private Git repository. Those routes work well on desktop but get fiddly on mobile, and none of them are end-to-end encrypted the way Obsidian Sync is. The honest trade-off: pay $4–8 a month for a mobile-friendly, encrypted, version-tracked setup that just works, or spend a little setup time to sync for free through a cloud drive you already have.
Obsidian Publish: turning notes into a website
Publish is a separate add-on that puts selected notes online as a browsable, searchable website with working internal links and the graph view. It is priced per published site, not per user: $8 per month billed annually or $10 per month billed monthly.
This is a niche purchase. Most people never need it — it is aimed at those building a public digital garden, documentation site, or wiki directly from their vault. If you just want your notes on your own devices, Publish is not part of your cost. If you want free alternatives, a static-site generator pointed at your Markdown files can produce a similar result for the price of hosting.
Catalyst: paying to support, not to unlock
Catalyst is easy to misread as a paid plan. It is not. It is a one-time donation that supports development and comes in three tiers — Insider at $25, Supporter at $50, and VIP at $100 or more. In return you get early access to insider builds, community badges in the forum and Discord, and access to a VIP channel.
Catalyst unlocks zero app features. Everything in Obsidian is already free without it. Buy it only if you want early betas or simply want to fund the project.
The 2025 commercial-license change
This is the update that reshaped Obsidian’s pricing, so it is worth its own section. On February 20, 2025, Obsidian announced it is now free for work. Before that date, anyone at a company with two or more employees was required to buy a Commercial license to use Obsidian on the job. That requirement is gone.
The Commercial license still exists, but it is now optional — $50 per user per year, positioned the same way Catalyst is for individuals: a way for organizations that rely on Obsidian to support it, not a gate you have to pass through. Obsidian said the old commercial terms were confusing and added needless complexity, and that removing the requirement fit its stated principle that everyone should have good tools to think and organize ideas. Nothing else changed: no accounts, no tracking, no ads, no feature limits, and your data stays in local Markdown files. For teams, this means the practical cost of standardizing on Obsidian is now zero unless you choose to pay Sync (per user) or send a support license their way.
Is Obsidian free?
Yes. The app is fully free, for personal and commercial use, with every feature unlocked and no time limit or seat cap. You never have to enter payment details to use it.
The only things you can pay for are optional and additive: Sync (if you want official encrypted syncing), Publish (if you want a public website from your notes), Catalyst (a donation), and a Commercial license (also effectively a donation now). None of them unlock functionality inside the editor — Obsidian’s plugins, themes, graph view, and canvas are all free.
When Obsidian isn’t the right fit
Price is no longer a reason to leave Obsidian, which changes the calculus for anyone shopping around. The real reasons people look elsewhere are structural: they want built-in cloud sync without a subscription, an easier out-of-the-box setup with less plugin tinkering, native real-time team collaboration, or a database-style workspace rather than a folder of files. If any of those describe you, the honest move is to compare on those features, not on cost — our Obsidian alternatives rundown covers the tools that address each of those gaps, and Obsidian vs OneNote is a good read if you specifically want free, built-in sync.
FAQ
Is Obsidian really free for commercial use? Yes. Since February 20, 2025, the Commercial license is optional. Any business can use Obsidian for work at no cost. Organizations can still buy $50-per-user-per-year licenses to support development, but they are not required.
Do I need Obsidian Sync? No. You can sync a vault for free through iCloud, Dropbox, OneDrive, or Git because it is just a folder of Markdown files. Sync is worth paying for if you want encrypted, version-tracked syncing that works smoothly on mobile without setup.
What is the difference between Sync Standard and Sync Plus? Standard ($4/month annually) gives 1 GB storage, one month of version history, and one vault. Plus ($8/month annually) gives 10 GB storage, twelve months of version history, and up to ten vaults, with optional expansion to 100 GB.
Does Catalyst unlock premium features? No. Catalyst is a one-time donation ($25, $50, or $100+) that grants early beta access and community perks, not app features. Everything in Obsidian is already free without it.
Ready to automate your busywork?
Carly schedules, researches, and briefs you—so you can focus on what matters.
See what people say
"Before Carly, I relied on a Calendly link, but the whole process felt impersonal and not very professional. Carly changed that by handling all the back-and-forth, so I'm no longer stuck in endless email threads trying to line up schedules.
Now Carly reaches out to candidates, shares my real-time availability, lets them pick a slot, then sends a Zoom link and drops it straight into my calendar. She sends reminders to both of us before each call, which has significantly reduced no-shows and last-minute confusion.
On top of scheduling, Carly acts like a full executive assistant, sending me my schedule the night before so I can prepare for each call. It reminds me of the old x.ai assistant, but Carly is noticeably smarter, faster, and better suited to my healthcare recruitment business."
