I get asked this question regularly: "How does Jottings compare to Obsidian Publish?" It's a fair question. Both platforms let you publish to the web from your markdown content. But they're solving different problems.
Let me walk you through the key differences—I'll be honest about where each shines.
The Philosophical Divide
Obsidian Publish is a digital garden tool. It's designed around the idea of interconnected knowledge, backlinks, bidirectional references, and the graph view. You're publishing your thinking process, your notes, the messy web of how you actually work. It's beautiful for that use case.
Jottings is a microblog. It's optimized for chronological publishing—short-form writing that stands on its own. Your latest thoughts appear first. People follow your feed. It's more like Twitter meets a personal blog.
This fundamental difference shapes everything else.
Structure and Organization
Obsidian Publish organizes content around relationships:
- Backlinks connect related notes
- Graph view visualizes your knowledge network
- Nested folders create hierarchies
- Your vault structure becomes the site structure
- Readers navigate through connections
Jottings uses chronological ordering:
- Newest posts appear first on your home page
- Posts are standalone (but can have tags)
- Simple, flat structure with optional organization
- Readers follow your feed like a blog
- Discovery happens through tags and archives
If you're building a personal knowledge base—like a digital garden of your research, ideas, and interconnected thoughts—Obsidian Publish is purpose-built for that. The backlinks and graph view are genuinely powerful for showing how ideas relate.
If you want to publish thoughts as they happen—a journal, quick ideas, daily updates, or regular writing—Jottings fits better.
Cost and Hosting
This is where many people choose Jottings.
Obsidian Publish: $8/month for one site, $16/month for unlimited sites. That's $96-192/year. You don't think about hosting, scaling, or technical setup—Obsidian handles everything.
Jottings: Free tier includes custom domain support and static site generation. Pro features start at $4.99/month if you want them (and you might not need them). Most users publish everything for free.
I designed Jottings to be radically affordable because I believe publishing shouldn't cost you a monthly subscription just to exist on the web.
The Features Breakdown
Obsidian Publish excels at:
- Linking notes together with backlinks
- Graph visualization of your knowledge network
- Nested folder structures for complex information
- Sync with your local Obsidian vault
- Mobile app support
Jottings focuses on:
- Speed and simplicity
- Static site generation (lightning fast)
- Custom domains included
- Photo uploads with CDN delivery
- Tags and feed discovery
- AI-powered jot suggestions (Pro)
- Low operational overhead
Jottings intentionally doesn't have backlinks or graph views. They would add complexity without serving the core use case—publishing your thoughts chronologically.
The Real Question: Who's Each For?
Choose Obsidian Publish if you:
- Take lots of notes and want to publish them
- Think in interconnected ideas and relationships
- Have a vault of existing markdown notes in Obsidian
- Like the graph view as a visualization tool
- Want seamless local-to-published sync
- Are okay with the monthly subscription cost
Choose Jottings if you:
- Want to publish a regular blog or journal
- Think chronologically (newest posts first)
- Prefer simplicity over interconnected knowledge graphs
- Want to own your data and publish to your own domain
- Like the idea of "write once, publish everywhere" with a simple interface
- Want to keep your publishing costs low
- Appreciate minimalist design
What About Writing Experience?
Both platforms use markdown, which I love. But the workflows differ.
In Obsidian, you're writing in your vault. Your notes exist locally, and publishing is an extra step. This means you can work offline, cross-link everything, and refine your thinking before the world sees it.
In Jottings, you're writing directly to publish. It's more like blogging—you have an idea, you write it, and it goes live. This suits a certain type of creator: people who think out loud, who publish frequently, who aren't overthinking every post.
Neither is objectively better. They're different workflows for different minds.
The Obsidian Ecosystem
One thing I have to acknowledge: Obsidian has a massive, thriving ecosystem. Plugins, themes, templates, extensive documentation. The community is active. If you're already in Obsidian for note-taking, Publish is a natural extension.
Jottings is smaller, simpler, and more focused. We're not trying to be everything. We're trying to be really good at one thing: helping you publish your thoughts without complexity or cost.
Honest Takes
Here's what I genuinely respect about Obsidian Publish:
- It's technically excellent
- The creators have a clear philosophy (local-first, privacy)
- It serves people who think in networks of ideas
- The graph view is genuinely innovative
Here's what I'm proud of with Jottings:
- It's genuinely affordable
- Setup takes minutes, not hours
- You own your domain and data
- The interface stays out of your way
- Performance is exceptional (static sites are fast)
The Deciding Factor
If you're sitting on a vault of interconnected notes and want to publish them as a knowledge garden, Obsidian Publish is the answer.
If you have thoughts to share with the world and want a simple, cost-effective way to publish regularly, Jottings is built for you.
Both platforms exist because publishing needs vary. I created Jottings because I wanted something simpler and cheaper for the chronological publishing use case. I'm not trying to beat Obsidian at being a knowledge graph tool—that's not what we do.
The best platform is the one that matches how you actually think and write.
If that's chronological, public-first, and simple, you know where to find me.
Ready to try Jottings? Create your free account and start publishing in minutes. No credit card required.