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Independently verified · Quarterly re-audit
EU VETTED
Alternatives to

European alternatives to Obsidian.

Local-first knowledge graph by a small Canadian-led team.

ALTERNATIVES
3
CLOUD-ACT · NONE
2
WITH BSI C5
0
FREE TIER
3

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TOP PICKS

Which are the closest Obsidian alternatives?

Ordered by feature parity and migration friction, which is weighted higher than feature breadth.

Joplin
France · Founded 2016
EU-SOVEREIGN
★ #1 PICK

Open-source E2EE note-taking app by French developer Laurent Cozic (2016); Joplin Cloud hosted in France; €2.99/mo; self-sync to any EU storage.

Public DPA Sub-processors Open source
FROM
€3/mo
CLOUD ACT
NONE
View profile →
Anytype
Germany · Founded 2019
EU-SOVEREIGN
★ #2 PICK

Berlin-based local-first peer-to-peer E2E-encrypted knowledge OS (Anytype, 2019); Any Source Available License; data lives on user device.

Public DPA Sub-processors Open source
FROM
—
CLOUD ACT
NONE
View profile →
Nuclino
Germany · Founded 2015
EU-HOSTED
★ #3 PICK

Munich-based founder-owned lightweight team wiki (Nuclino GmbH, 2015), all-German hosting, SOC 2 Type II, 12,000+ teams incl. NASA, MIT.

Public DPA Sub-processors Open source
FROM
—
CLOUD ACT
MATERIAL
View profile →
SIDE-BY-SIDE

How do the 3 European alternatives to Obsidian compare?

All 3 alternatives, benchmarked against Obsidian.

Feature comparison

Beyond compliance: how these alternatives compare on the capabilities you actually use day to day.

Feature Joplin Anytype Nuclino
Self-hostable Yes Yes No
Real-time collaboration No Yes Yes
Databases / tables No Yes Yes
Public publishing Yes Yes Yes
Version history Yes Yes Yes
Granular permissions Yes Yes
Offline mode Yes Yes No
AI assist No No Yes
WHAT YOU'RE LEAVING
What are you leaving behind with Obsidian?

Listed for transparency. Every product on this page is benchmarked against this baseline.

Obsidian US-incorporated

Local-first knowledge graph by a small Canadian-led team.

US-based
OWNERSHIP
US-OWNED
CLOUD ACT
DIRECT
HOSTING
Likely AWS · US
SCHREMS II
Default SCC + supp.
METHODOLOGY

How we verified each row above.

For every product we read the public DPA, sub-processors document, hosting region declaration, and corporate ownership records. Each is timestamped. Signals are editorial, re-verified quarterly. We never accept self-attestation.

Reviewed by the EU Vetted editorial team · Editorial guidelines

Read methodology →