Obsidian

The best note taking app - hands down

Pros:

Word's cannot express my gratitude to the Obsidian app and the amazing community built around it. I use this app daily on my desktop and mobile with cloud syncing. It has allowed me to take notes on anything at any time, and most importantly, made it easy to review my notes so I can learn from them.

Cons:

Obsidian is unique in that there are new plugins being built all the time by the community. That help the app be more intuitive and feature rich. However I still feel their graph view has a lot of potential for improvement. I think the graph view right now is visually interesting to look at, but not nearly as effective as it could be. I'd like to be able to manipulate it more, and see more clearly the patterns between links, right now it becomes overwhelming as there is too many interlinked notes. It's difficult to gleam insights from them.

The best knowledge management software

Comments: I have been looking for years for a good (not even great) note-taking / knowledge management system. I have tried many different apps (like Evernote, Simplenote, Gnome Notes, Google Keep, etc.), but I did not like anything. I started considering writing my own app and was taking some notes. Then, Obsidian arrived and blew my mind. I increased my efficiency 100-fold after starting to use it for basically everything (from my notes on string theory and machine learning to my cooking recipes). I would never go back to any other system.

Pros:

The fact that it's very fast to take notes (simple markdown format, Latex included…) and to retrieve quickly something (through the fuzzy filename matching, full-text search or tags). That it's possible to sync across various devices (with an excellent mobile app) is outstanding. The extension system is very helpful to supplement features. Also having an open file format is reassuring in case the creators stop updating the app.

Cons:

The single most annoying aspect is the lack of proper bibliography / citations management. There is a plugin, but I don't like too much how it works. Otherwise, there is no default.

Great Tool for Quick Note Taking

Pros:

The application is very light and easy to use, and provides easy sync across many platforms. It also has amazing vim support, which is very convenient for vim enthusiasts.

Cons:

As the application is made to be lightweight, it might not feel as organized as something like Notion, and the formatting options are not as easy to find and implement as Notion.

Note "Vaults"

Comments: I did like Obsidian and how full it was. I stored notes and segments of legislation that I needed to reference frequently. I could find any note with the open display.

Pros:

Notes are stored in Obsidian "Vaults", this certainly makes me feel more secure! Obsidian asks if you'd prefer internal or external storage, notes can be read offline too. Notebooks aren't displayed in a grid pattern like apps on your phone, they're displayed as dots and can be moved as you'd like. I like this and it's really ideal for a large number of notes. Obsidian can actually function as a knowledge base too. When clicking on a dot, a text preview is displayed. The background is dark and text is white, if your eyes strain easily or you have a lot of screen time during your work day this is great. Obsidian has quick access to most format options and text tools, I like the quick access reference tool.

Cons:

I found it to be confusing, using it certainly wasn't effortless. The icons are very light grey and most of them don't connect to the action you'd expect. I spent a lot of time looking and I deleted notes without meaning to.

The App for Zettelkasten

Comments: Very good app for note taking and use with the Zettelkasten method.

Pros:

This is the only app I found realy useful to use with the Zettlekasten note taking method. Even being an app that works on local files, its quite easy to setup a folder on a cloud based storage like Gdrive and have all your devices sync the files seamlessly. With the community plugins its very easy to customize Obisidian for any workflow you use for your writing.

Cons:

The mobile app UX could be improved. It takes some time to get used to navigate and use it.