Altretta vs Obsidian
Everything you like about file-over-app notes — plus answers that cite their source, a signed history, and an encrypted team vault.
Which one should you choose?
Obsidian is excellent, and for a great many people it is the right answer. It is local-first, it is fast, and its ecosystem is something nothing here matches. Altretta starts from the same foundation — your notes are Markdown files you own — and adds a layer aimed at one thing: making an AI’s answers checkable. Answers come back with the passages behind them, every change lands in a signed history that never destructively deletes anything, and a shared vault is encrypted on your device with access you can take back. If you are not going to point an AI at your notes, that layer costs you something and buys you nothing, and Obsidian is the better tool.
What they share, and where they differ.
| Capability | Altretta | Obsidian |
|---|---|---|
| Notes are Markdown files you own | YesOrdinary files in a folder you chose. Open them in any editor. | YesPlain text Markdown filesobsidian.md |
| Platforms | macOS · Windows · Linux | Windows · Mac · Linux · iOS · Androidobsidian.md/download |
| Plugins | PartialAn official hub. Plugins are signed and have to declare the capabilities they use before they run. It is small. | YesThousands of pluginsobsidian.md |
| Free to use | YesThe desktop app is free forever, with one synced folder. | YesFree for personal useobsidian.md/pricing |
| Encrypted sync | YesInto storage you already own — your Dropbox, your OneDrive, a network share, a USB stick. No server of ours in the path and no key escrow. | YesEnd-to-end encryptedobsidian.md/sync |
| Entry paid tier | Pro at €4.99/mo, with as many synced folders as you like. | $4/user/mobilled yearlyobsidian.md/pricing1 GB of synced storageobsidian.md/sync1 synced vaultobsidian.md/sync1 month of version historyobsidian.md/sync |
| Larger tier | There is no second tier. Sync writes into storage you already pay for, so there is nothing for us to meter. | $8/user/mobilled yearlyobsidian.md/pricing10 GB of synced storageobsidian.md/sync12 months of version historyobsidian.md/sync |
| Publishing a site | YesIncluded in Pro. Every published page carries its provenance and its own verifier, so a reader checks the signature in the browser. | $8/site/mobilled yearlyobsidian.md/pricing |
| Using it at work | Team, priced per seat, with the shared encrypted vault. | $50/user/yrbilled yearlyobsidian.md/pricing |
| Answers that cite the note they came from | YesCited passages with the file and the line numbers, from the model you connect over MCP. | Not verified |
| Signed history and time travel | YesEd25519-signed and append-only. Removal is a signed tombstone, never a delete, so you can travel back to any point. | Not verified |
| Encrypted team vault with revocation | YesNote contents encrypted on your device. Access is per person, and removing someone rotates the key. | Not verified |
| Reads your code repository | YesSymbol extraction in twenty languages, in the same signed graph as the notes. | Not verified |
| Flashcards, tasks, canvas, PDF highlights | YesSpaced repetition, a Kanban board and a calendar over your dated tasks, canvas boards, and PDF highlights signed into the history. | Not verified |
Verified Every figure here about another product was read from the pages linked below, on that date, and from nowhere else. Follow them and check us — that is the whole idea.
“Partial” marks a difference in focus, and the note says which. “Not verified” means it has not been checked on Obsidian’s own pages, so nothing is being claimed either way — not that the answer is no.
What Altretta and Obsidian share.
Both start from the same principle: your notes are yours, not someone else’s cloud.
Local-first
Your notes live on your disk and work offline. Nothing depends on a server being switched on.
Markdown you own
Every note is a standard Markdown file. Open it in any editor, back it up, or take it with you whenever you like.
No lock-in
No closed formats and no painful export. Your knowledge stays with you rather than being held by the app.
A graph you can see
Links between notes, backlinks, and a graph view of the whole vault — the thing that makes a pile of notes into a body of work.
The verifiable layer a note editor does not give you.
On the same file-based foundation, Altretta adds what lets you trust your notes — and your AI.
Answers with their receipts
Ask a question and the answer comes back with the passages it was drawn from, each with a file and line numbers you can open. You bring your own model over MCP, so there is no built-in LLM and no extra bill.
Your AI gets the passage, not the pile
Measured on the demo vault of 43 notes over 24 pre-registered questions: 26.5% fewer input tokens than an assistant that already knows which files hold the answer, and 94.3% fewer than pasting your whole vault into the prompt. The protocol is published, including the questions where the saving is negative.
Signed history and time travel
An append-only log signed with Ed25519. Nothing is destructively deleted: go back in time, compare versions, and restore any state with provenance you can check.
Encrypted, revocable team vault
Share a vault whose note contents are encrypted on your device. Access is per person and revocable — remove someone and the key rotates — and the audit log is hash-chained, so a gap in it shows.
It reads your repository too
Twenty languages have symbol extractors, so the blast radius of a change and the drift between a document and the code it describes live in the same signed graph as your notes.
Encryption that hides more than the words
What lands in your synced folder has scrambled fixed-length names and no folder structure, so neither the shape of your vault nor the length of a path leaks. There is no escrow and no reset: lose both keys and it is gone.
When Obsidian is the better fit today.
Obsidian has been polished for years and leads in places Altretta does not. If any of this is you, it is the right choice.
You need it on your phone
Obsidian runs on iOS and Android. Altretta has no mobile build of any kind — not a beta, not a companion app — and that is the single biggest reason to stay.
You live in the plugin ecosystem
Obsidian’s plugin library is enormous and mature. Altretta’s hub is signed and capability-gated, which is the right design, and it is nowhere near that breadth yet.
You want the community and the track record
Years of themes, guides, videos and forum answers mean somebody has already solved almost anything you will hit. That is worth a great deal and it cannot be shipped.
You are never going to point an AI at your notes
Most of what Altretta adds is in service of making an assistant checkable. If that is not a problem you have, you would be paying attention to machinery you will not use.
What happens to your notes if you move.
The honest version, including the part that is manual. Nothing here converts your vault into a format only Altretta can read.
The files come as they are
Altretta has an Obsidian import that reads your vault folder directly. They are already Markdown, so nothing is converted and nothing is rewritten.
Your plugins do not come with you
Anything a community plugin generated is just text once it is in a note, and it stays. The plugin itself has no equivalent unless Altretta ships that capability natively.
You can leave the same way
Your vault stays a folder of Markdown files the entire time you use Altretta, so leaving is closing the app. Export adds Word, LaTeX, PDF and HTML if you want a copy in another shape.
Before you switch.
Is Altretta an Obsidian alternative?
Yes, in the same file-over-app spirit: your notes are local Markdown you own. The difference is a verifiable layer on top — answers that cite their source, a signed history, and an encrypted team vault — built so you can check what your AI says about your notes rather than take its word.
Will my Obsidian vault work in Altretta?
Yes. There is a dedicated Obsidian import that reads the vault folder, and because both store standard Markdown your notes are the same files on the same disk. What does not carry across is anything that only exists inside a community plugin.
Does Altretta lock me in?
No, and for the same reason Obsidian does not: every note is a plain Markdown file you can open in any editor, back up, or take with you. On top of that the signed history never destructively deletes anything, so your provenance leaves with you as well.
Is my data private? Does it stay local?
Your notes live on your disk and the app works offline. Three things you switch on deliberately do send content elsewhere, and we would rather name them: the AI client you connect passes the cited passages to whichever model you chose, hosted publishing uploads the pages you selected to a server we run, and encrypted sync writes ciphertext into storage you picked. Everything else stays on the machine.
Keep your files. Gain proof.
Download Altretta free for macOS, Windows and Linux. Your Markdown notes work as they are — and now your AI answers with its receipts.