obsidian-mcp-tools
If your team already writes notes in Obsidian, this plugin makes those notes readable and editable by Claude or Cursor. Your agent can answer questions from your notes, add new ones, and link them together — so your meeting notes, SOPs, and internal docs become your agent's long-term memory. No code required: install from the Obsidian community plugin store, click connect, done.
- Non-technical founders with an Obsidian vault already in use
- Teams that keep SOPs, meeting notes, or playbooks in Markdown
- Anyone who wants a no-terminal install path
- Single-user or small-team setups (1–10 people)
What you'll do
obsidian-mcp-tools is the easiest way to turn an Obsidian vault into an AI-readable brain. Everything below happens in the Obsidian app — no terminal, no Docker, no config files. Budget 5 minutes.
Before you start
- Obsidian installed on your computer (free from obsidian.md)
- A vault with at least one note in it
- Claude Desktop OR Claude Code OR Cursor installed (any MCP-capable client)
Step-by-step install
- 011. Open Obsidian's community plugin browser
In Obsidian, click the gear icon in the bottom-left (Settings). In the settings panel, click 'Community plugins' in the left sidebar. If this is your first community plugin, click 'Turn on community plugins' and accept the prompt — Obsidian just wants you to acknowledge that community plugins are third-party code.
- 022. Search for the plugin
Click 'Browse' under Community plugins. In the search bar, type 'mcp tools'. You should see 'MCP Tools' by jacksteamdev near the top. Click it.
Tip: There are multiple Obsidian MCP plugins. You specifically want the one maintained by jacksteamdev — the card should show 'jacksteamdev' as the author. - 033. Install and enable
On the plugin's page, click 'Install'. After it installs, click 'Enable'. That's it — the plugin is now running inside Obsidian.
- 044. Copy the MCP config
Back in Settings, click 'MCP Tools' in the left sidebar (new entry now that it's enabled). The plugin will display a snippet of JSON — that's the config your AI client needs to connect. It looks roughly like this:
{ "mcpServers": { "obsidian": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "obsidian-mcp-tools"] } } }Tip: If the plugin shows a specific endpoint or port, copy exactly what it shows — the details may vary slightly by version. - 055. Paste it into your Claude / Cursor config
Open your AI client's MCP config file. In Claude Desktop this is claude_desktop_config.json (Settings → Developer → Edit Config). In Claude Code this is .claude/mcp.json at your project root. In Cursor it's cursor_mcp.json in settings. Paste the obsidian entry into the mcpServers block.
- 066. Restart your AI client and test
Quit Claude (or Cursor) completely, then reopen it. Start a new chat and say something like: 'Can you read my Obsidian vault? List the titles of my 5 most recent notes.' If it answers with real note titles from your vault, you're done.
Your first 10 minutes
- 01Ask your agent to summarize the 10 most recent notes in a single paragraph — great sanity check that it can read.
- 02Ask it to create a new note titled 'Testing MCP' with 3 bullet points about today. Check your vault — the note should appear.
- 03Ask it to find any note that mentions a specific teammate or project. If search returns relevant results, semantic recall is working.
- 04Point your agent at your SOPs folder and ask: 'Walk me through our [specific process] as if onboarding a new hire.'
- 05Add the Cognition CLO MCP (5 more minutes) to start modeling which concepts your team is about to forget.
Troubleshooting
Claude says it can't find the obsidian server.
Check two things: (1) Obsidian must be running while you use the agent — the MCP server lives inside Obsidian. (2) Fully quit and relaunch Claude Desktop after editing the config.
Claude can read some notes but not others.
Check Obsidian's plugin settings — you can configure which folders are exposed. The default is usually the whole vault, but some users restrict it.
I don't see MCP Tools under Settings even after enabling it.
Restart Obsidian. Some plugins only register their settings panel after a full app restart.
obsidian-mcp-tools holds the knowledge. Cognition CLO models retention per employee per concept using a Weibull forgetting curve — so you see decay before it becomes a missed SOP or a failed audit.