Scrinium vs Obsidian: encryption-first vs plugin-optional

How Obsidian handles encryption

Obsidian’s encryption story is genuinely better than most people assume, and it is also conditional. The vault on your disk is a folder of plaintext Markdown files, so anything that can read the filesystem — a backup, a stolen laptop without full-disk encryption, a sync client, a plugin — reads your notes. Full-vault encryption at rest means adding a community plugin.

Obsidian Sync, the first-party subscription, does encrypt data end to end with a key derived from your password, so Obsidian cannot read what it stores. That protection covers synced data, requires the paid add-on, and still leaves a plaintext working copy on every device.

Scrinium does not make encryption a mode. Every note is encrypted on your device under its own key before it exists anywhere else, the keys live only in memory while the vault is unlocked, and the same guarantee applies on every device — desktop browser, phone, tablet. There is no plugin to install and no unencrypted local copy left behind in the app’s own storage.

Who can read your notes

This is Obsidian’s strongest card: the vault is a folder of Markdown files you own outright. No service can revoke access to it, and ten years from now the files still open in any text editor.

The cost is that everything around the files is app-shaped. Plugin configuration, themes, and workspace layouts live in hidden folders; making the vault work on a phone means syncing that folder; and the ecosystem that makes Obsidian powerful is the same surface where a malicious plugin can read everything.

Scrinium keeps the portable format and adds portability of the service. Notes are Markdown, export is Markdown, and the backend is a dumb encrypted blob store you can self-host — so your vault is not tied to a vendor account any more than an Obsidian folder is tied to Obsidian.

Editing: Obsidian vs Scrinium

Obsidian’s Live Preview is excellent and it is not WYSIWYG. Markdown syntax stays visible around the cursor, tables and embeds behave like source, and the experience is built for someone who thinks in Markdown. If that is you, it is a feature.

Scrinium renders inline as you type: headings, lists, task lists, tables, fenced code with syntax highlighting, blockquotes, images, and math all appear formatted with the cursor moving through them. It is the Typora-style model rather than the source-with-preview model, which reads better on a phone and on a small laptop screen.

Pricing: what you actually pay for

Obsidian’s app is free for personal use, and its sync and publish services are subscriptions. Many people run their own sync through iCloud, Git, or a NAS — free, workable, and not end-to-end encrypted unless you build that yourself.

Scrinium is free where Obsidian charges: unlimited notes, unlimited encrypted sync, unlimited devices, no add-on. Pro and Supporter tiers add features — attachments, version history, burner notes, graph view, templates, math and diagrams — rather than unlocking sync or removing a note cap.

Where Obsidian is the better choice

Choose Obsidian when the vault is the point: thousands of notes on a desktop, a plugin for every workflow, community themes, local graph and search over files you can also grep, and a habit of working in Markdown source. It has years of ecosystem behind it and an offline-first model that assumes you own the machine.

It is also the better fit if you are happy with local-only or self-managed sync. Scrinium deliberately spends complexity on encryption and cross-device sync, and a desktop power user who never leaves one machine does not need that.

Where Scrinium is the better choice

Choose Scrinium when the plaintext copy is the problem: a work laptop you do not administer, a shared machine, a cloud backup you do not control, or a phone that syncs to a folder. Encryption-by-default removes an entire category of “where did that file end up?” questions.

Scrinium is also the pragmatic choice when you want the same vault in a browser, on iOS, and on Android without curating a sync stack, and when you would rather search your notes locally over decrypted content in memory than trust a third-party index.

Moving from Obsidian to Scrinium

Migration is almost trivial: an Obsidian vault is Markdown files with attachments, so point Scrinium’s import at the folder (or a subset of it) and it lands as encrypted notes. Wikilinks survive as text, and can be tidied over time.

A sensible hybrid is common: keep the Obsidian vault for desktop power work, and import the notes that matter away from your desk — the ones you would not want syncing through a folder you do not control.

Questions people ask