Is Obsidian or Terra better?

Neither clearly leads. Obsidian starts at Free and Terra at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.

Which is cheaper, Obsidian or Terra?

Obsidian starts at Free and Terra at Free.

Does Obsidian or Terra run on more platforms?

Obsidian runs on Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android. Terra runs on Web, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure.

Can I use Obsidian for free?

Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.

What is Obsidian best used for?

Obsidian is most often used for local-first markdown note taking with no account required, linking notes into a personal knowledge graph, syncing a vault across devices with end-to-end encryption on the paid add-on, publishing a public site from a vault. Of those, local-first markdown note taking with no account required and linking notes into a personal knowledge graph are not what Terra is typically brought in for.

What can Obsidian do that Terra cannot?

Obsidian covers Bidirectional linking, Graph view visualization, Markdown support, Local file storage. Terra covers No platform licence fee, Cloud pass-through billing, WDL workflow execution, Notebook environments.

Research · head to head

Obsidian vs Terra

Obsidian

Research

A powerful knowledge base on top of a local folder of plain text Markdown files

From: Free
Rated: -

Full review Website

Terra

Research

Open biomedical research platform for genomic analysis, priced only by the cloud you consume

From: Free
Rated: -

Full review Website

The short version

Each has a real cost: Obsidian sync is a paid add-on at $4 per month billed annually rather than part of the app; Terra the absence of a licence fee hides the real cost driver: an idle notebook virtual machine left running overnight, or a workspace bucket full of intermediate workflow outputs, quietly consumes grant money with no vendor invoice to prompt a review.
They diverge on capability: Obsidian covers Bidirectional linking, Terra covers No platform licence fee.
Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Obsidian and Terra actually diverge.

Attributes where Obsidian and Terra differ
Attribute	Obsidian	Terra
Pricing model	Unknown	Open source, no licence fee
Platforms	Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android	Web, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure
Founded	2020	Unknown

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Research).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Obsidian

Bidirectional linking
Graph view visualization
Markdown support
Local file storage
Plugin ecosystem
Custom CSS themes
Templates
Search and tags

Only in Terra

No platform licence fee
Cloud pass-through billing
WDL workflow execution
Notebook environments
Controlled-access data
Workspace sharing
Compliance posture
Multi-cloud

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Obsidian

Local-first markdown note taking with no account requirednot Terra
Linking notes into a personal knowledge graphnot Terra
Syncing a vault across devices with end-to-end encryption on the paid add-onnot Terra
Publishing a public site from a vaultnot Terra
Extending the editor with community pluginsnot Terra

Terra

A genomics lab running whole-genome alignment and variant calling pipelines without provisioning or maintaining a local clusternot Obsidian
A consortium sharing controlled-access human data across institutions where the data cannot be copied to each sitenot Obsidian
A health system analysing patient genomic data under a HIPAA business associate agreementnot Obsidian
A federal or federally funded project needing FedRAMP Moderate authorisation for its analysis environmentnot Obsidian

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Obsidian

Sync is a paid add-on at $4 per month billed annually rather than part of the app
Publishing to the web is a further $8 per month per site
Commercial use asks for a $50 per user per year licence, though the vendor states it is not required
Collaboration is limited compared with a hosted notes tool, since the vault is local files first

Terra

The absence of a licence fee hides the real cost driver: an idle notebook virtual machine left running overnight, or a workspace bucket full of intermediate workflow outputs, quietly consumes grant money with no vendor invoice to prompt a review.
Cost governance is entirely the customer responsibility, and grant-funded groups without a cloud engineer routinely overspend before anyone reads the Google or Azure bill in enough detail to find the cause.
It assumes genuine bioinformatics competence: writing or adapting WDL workflows, managing data tables and debugging failed tasks are all on you, so a wet lab without computational staff cannot use it productively.
Feature parity between the Google Cloud and Azure deployments is not identical, so a decision on cloud provider constrains which capabilities and datasets you can reach and is expensive to reverse later.
It is a research platform rather than a regulated clinical system: it is not a validated GxP environment and does not carry the qualification package a diagnostic or submission workflow would require, so clinical use needs additional infrastructure and validation you provide yourself.

Pricing, plan by plan

Obsidian

Free

Obsidian Sync$4/month
- Sync notes across devices
Obsidian Publish$8/month
- Turn notes into a website

Terra

Free

Terra platformFree
- No charge for the platform, administration, security controls or frontline support
- Workspaces, workflow execution and notebook environments included
- Available on Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure
Cloud consumption$undefined/month
- Google Cloud or Azure charges passed through at cost with no markup
- Running notebook virtual machines around 0.22 USD per hour, roughly 0.027 USD per hour when paused
- Storage billed continuously on workspace buckets and intermediate workflow outputs

Which should you pick?

Choose Obsidian if

You need bidirectional linking.
You want to start without paying.
You work on Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android.
You also want graph view visualization.

Obsidian review

Choose Terra if

You need no platform licence fee.
You want to start without paying.
You work on Web, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure.
You also want cloud pass-through billing.

Terra review

Questions people ask

Is Obsidian or Terra better?: Neither clearly leads. Obsidian starts at Free and Terra at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Obsidian or Terra?: Obsidian starts at Free and Terra at Free.
Does Obsidian or Terra run on more platforms?: Obsidian runs on Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android. Terra runs on Web, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure.
Can I use Obsidian for free?: Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Obsidian best used for?: Obsidian is most often used for local-first markdown note taking with no account required, linking notes into a personal knowledge graph, syncing a vault across devices with end-to-end encryption on the paid add-on, publishing a public site from a vault. Of those, local-first markdown note taking with no account required and linking notes into a personal knowledge graph are not what Terra is typically brought in for.
What can Obsidian do that Terra cannot?: Obsidian covers Bidirectional linking, Graph view visualization, Markdown support, Local file storage. Terra covers No platform licence fee, Cloud pass-through billing, WDL workflow execution, Notebook environments.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Obsidian: Is Obsidian free?

Yes. The core Obsidian application is 100% free for personal and commercial use with no limitations. You can use unlimited vaults and every core feature without payment.

Source

Terra: Is Terra really free?

The platform is. There is no licence fee. Everything you pay is Google Cloud or Azure compute, storage and egress, passed through at cost.

Obsidian: What file format does Obsidian use?

Obsidian stores every note as a plain Markdown file. Because it uses standard Markdown instead of a proprietary format, your notes remain portable and can be edited with many other Markdown editors.

Source

Terra: What actually drives the bill?

Running virtual machines and stored data. Pausing notebooks drops a virtual machine from about 0.22 to about 0.027 dollars an hour, and deleting intermediate workflow outputs is the other main saving.

Obsidian: Can I collaborate with others in Obsidian?

The core application does not include built-in team collaboration features. However, Obsidian offers optional add-ons and can be used with version control systems or cloud storage for collaboration.

Source

Terra: Can I use it with protected health information?

Yes. Terra signs HIPAA business associate agreements and GDPR data processing agreements, and the Azure deployment holds FedRAMP Moderate authorisation.

Terra: Is it validated for clinical or GxP use?

No. It is a research platform. Regulated clinical or submission workflows need validation and controls you build yourself.

Obsidian vs Terra

Obsidian

Terra

The short version

Where they differ

What each one covers

Only in Obsidian

Only in Terra

What people use each for

Obsidian

Terra

Where each one falls short

Obsidian

Terra

Pricing, plan by plan

Obsidian

Terra

Which should you pick?

Choose Obsidian if

Choose Terra if

Questions people ask

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Related pages

More on Obsidian

More on Terra

Keep looking

Other head to heads