Claudian

Community

Bring Claude Code, Codex, and other coding agents into your Obsidian vault

★ 15.4k Stars Category · Dev Tools Very popular Source revision 3011a8c93723

62FMRS · C

Claudian is a well-documented, actively maintained (MIT-licensed, sponsored) Obsidian plugin that hosts multiple AI coding-agent CLIs inside a vault; it consumes MCP servers as a client rather than exposing MCP tools itself, so no server-side tool list or install_config applies.

Reliability

8/20

Security and permissions

13/20

Maintenance

14/20

Documentation

15/20

Setup experience

12/20

Read the FMRS scoring method →

Claudian is an open-source (MIT-licensed) Obsidian plugin that embeds AI coding agents — Claude Code, Codex, Grok Build, OpenCode, and Pi — as collaborators inside an Obsidian vault. It turns the vault into the agent's working directory, enabling file read/write, search, bash execution, and multi-step workflows via a chat sidebar, inline text editing, slash commands, and @mentions. Claudian itself is not an MCP server; it functions as an MCP-capable client, letting the Claude Code harness connect to external MCP servers over stdio, SSE, or HTTP from within Obsidian.

Setup

Recommended: in Obsidian, go to Settings → Community plugins → Browse, search for "Claudian", install, then enable it; or install directly from the community plugin page. From source: clone the repo into the vault's .obsidian/plugins folder, run npm install and npm run build, then enable "Claudian" in Settings → Community plugins.

Fit and risk

Best for

Obsidian users who want an AI coding-agent chat and inline editor built into their vault
Developers already using Claude Code, Codex, or similar CLIs who want vault-aware access to them
Note-takers who want agent-assisted file read/write, search, and multi-step workflows scoped to their vault

Not for

Users looking for a standalone MCP server to add tools/resources to an MCP client — Claudian is a client/host, not an MCP server
Mobile Obsidian users — the plugin is desktop only (macOS, Linux, Windows)
Users without any supported CLI harness (Claude Code, Codex, Grok Build, OpenCode, or Pi) installed and a compatible API/subscription provider

Required permissions

Read/write/edit access to files within the Obsidian vault (the agent's working directory)
Bash/shell command execution via the underlying CLI harness
Network access to the selected AI provider (Anthropic, OpenAI, xAI, or OpenCode/Pi providers) and to any configured MCP server endpoints

Risks and side effects

Broad file read/write and bash access to the vault means a misbehaving or misprompted agent could modify or delete notes
Input, attached files, images, and tool outputs are sent to the selected third-party API provider, so sensitive vault content could leave the local machine
MCP servers configured within the plugin are additional third-party endpoints whose trustworthiness is outside Claudian's control

Troubleshooting

If the CLI isn't auto-detected, leave the CLI path setting empty first, then manually set Settings → Advanced → CLI path using `which claude` (macOS/Linux) or `where.exe claude` (Windows)
On Windows, avoid `.cmd`/`.ps1` wrappers — use the native `.exe` for native installs, or `cli-wrapper.cjs` for npm installs
If an npm-installed CLI and Node.js live in different directories, GUI apps like Obsidian may not find Node — add the Node bin directory to PATH in Settings → Environment, or install a native binary instead
Confirm Obsidian is v1.7.2+ and running on desktop (macOS, Linux, Windows), since Claudian is desktop-only

Use cases

Chat with Claude Code, Codex, Grok Build, OpenCode, or Pi directly inside Obsidian notes

Inline-edit note text with word-level diff preview via an AI agent

Use vault files, subagents, and MCP servers as @mentions in agent conversations

Manage multiple agent chat sessions across tabs or a dual-pane session manager

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