Obsidian

obsidian.md

Obsidian is a local-first, Markdown-based note-taking and personal knowledge base app made by Dynalist Inc.

  • Productivity software
  • active
  • Founded 2020
  • Researched Sep 2026
Confirmed
Age6 years
Likely
Based inOakville, Canada
Likely
Employees6-10Named team roster on obsidian.md/about (6 people plus community volunteers), 2026
Confirmed
FundingSelf-funded
Confirmed
PlatformsiPhone, Android, Mac, Windows, Linux
Confirmed
Founders2 foundersShida Li, Erica Xu

The story

Obsidian was created by Shida Li and Erica Xu, who had previously built the outliner app Dynalist together after meeting at the University of Waterloo. They released Obsidian as a free beta in March 2020, grew it into a widely used, plugin-extensible knowledge management tool, and in 2023 brought on community contributor Steph Ango as CEO.

Timeline

  1. Founded2015

    Dynalist launched

    Shida Li and Erica Xu launch outliner app Dynalist, precursor company product

  2. LaunchMar 2020

    Obsidian public beta

    Obsidian beta released during early COVID-19 lockdown

  3. LaunchOct 2022

    Obsidian 1.0 released

    Version 1.0.0 shipped after two years of beta development

  4. New platformDec 2022

    Canvas feature added

    Spatial, freeform canvas for arranging and linking notes

  5. MilestoneFeb 2023

    Steph Ango becomes CEO

    Community contributor Steph Ango joins as CEO after Lumi acquisition

  6. LaunchSep 2024

    Web Clipper app launched

    iOS Obsidian Web Clipper app released on the App Store

Founders

  • Shida Li

    Co-founder, CTO

    Co-founded Dynalist in 2015; previously a software engineer intern at Dropbox

  • Erica Xu

    Co-founder, COO

    Co-founded Dynalist in 2015; earlier software engineer intern at Quizlet

10 sourcesEvery fact above links back to these.
  1. About - Obsidianobsidian.md
  2. Obsidian - Sharpen your thinkingobsidian.md
  3. Obsidian (software) - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org
  4. Dynalist Inc. - Wikidatawikidata.org
  5. Obsidian - Crunchbase Company Profile & Fundingcrunchbase.com
  6. Erica Xu - Co-founder @ Dynalist - Crunchbase Person Profilecrunchbase.com
  7. History of Obsidian: Second Brain to AI Knowledge OStaskade.com
  8. Obsidian - Connected Notes - App Storeapps.apple.com
  9. Obsidian Web Clipper - App Storeapps.apple.com
  10. Obsidian - Apps on Google Playplay.google.com
Suggest a correction