Obsidian Brain
local MCP serverObsidian Brain is a local MCP server: Obsidian MCP server: semantic search, knowledge graph, and vault editing. No plugin required. Install it from npm as obsidian-brain.
Installation
Terminal
claude mcp add obsidian-brain -e VAULT_PATH=... -e DATA_DIR=... -e EMBEDDING_PRESET=... -e EMBEDDING_MODEL=... -e EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=... -e OLLAMA_BASE_URL=... -e OLLAMA_EMBEDDING_DIM=... -e OLLAMA_NUM_CTX=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_AUTO_PULL=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_BYOM_AUTO_PULL=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_WATCH=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_CATCHUP=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_WATCH_DEBOUNCE_MS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_COMMUNITY_DEBOUNCE_MS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_TOOL_TIMEOUT_MS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_MAX_CHUNK_TOKENS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_CONFIG_DIR=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_DEBUG=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_LOG_FORMAT=... -- npx -y obsidian-brain
Run in your project folder. Add --scope user to use it everywhere.
Claude Desktop, Cursor & other clients
Add to claude_desktop_config.json or .cursor/mcp.json.
{
"mcpServers": {
"obsidian-brain": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"-y",
"obsidian-brain"
],
"env": {
"VAULT_PATH": "...",
"DATA_DIR": "...",
"EMBEDDING_PRESET": "...",
"EMBEDDING_MODEL": "...",
"EMBEDDING_PROVIDER": "...",
"OLLAMA_BASE_URL": "...",
"OLLAMA_EMBEDDING_DIM": "...",
"OLLAMA_NUM_CTX": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_AUTO_PULL": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_BYOM_AUTO_PULL": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_WATCH": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_CATCHUP": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_WATCH_DEBOUNCE_MS": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_COMMUNITY_DEBOUNCE_MS": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_TOOL_TIMEOUT_MS": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_MAX_CHUNK_TOKENS": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_CONFIG_DIR": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_DEBUG": "...",
"OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_LOG_FORMAT": "..."
}
}
}
}Fill in the environment variables with your own credentials.
What you need
- Runtime: Node.js 18+ (runs with npx).
- MCP client: Claude Code, Codex, Antigravity, Claude Desktop, Cursor or any other client that speaks MCP over stdio.
- Environment variables:
VAULT_PATH,DATA_DIR,EMBEDDING_PRESET,EMBEDDING_MODEL,EMBEDDING_PROVIDER,OLLAMA_BASE_URL,OLLAMA_EMBEDDING_DIM,OLLAMA_NUM_CTX,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_AUTO_PULL,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_BYOM_AUTO_PULL,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_WATCH,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_CATCHUP,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_WATCH_DEBOUNCE_MS,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_COMMUNITY_DEBOUNCE_MS,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_TOOL_TIMEOUT_MS,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_MAX_CHUNK_TOKENS,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_CONFIG_DIR,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_DEBUG,OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_LOG_FORMAT
Summary
Obsidian MCP server: semantic search, knowledge graph, and vault editing. No plugin required.
Obsidian Brain vs similar servers
| Server | Stars | Type | API key | Runtime |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Obsidian Brain | 11 | Local | Yes | npm |
| Obsidian Hybrid Search | 106 | Local | Yes | npm |
| seekstone | 29 | Local | Yes | npm |
| Obsidian Everywhere | 15 | Local | No | npm |
| Firecrawl MCP Server | 7,526 | Local | Yes | npm |
Questions
It reads 19 environment variables: VAULT_PATH, DATA_DIR, EMBEDDING_PRESET, EMBEDDING_MODEL, EMBEDDING_PROVIDER, OLLAMA_BASE_URL, OLLAMA_EMBEDDING_DIM, OLLAMA_NUM_CTX, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_AUTO_PULL, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_BYOM_AUTO_PULL, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_WATCH, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_CATCHUP, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_WATCH_DEBOUNCE_MS, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_COMMUNITY_DEBOUNCE_MS, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_TOOL_TIMEOUT_MS, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_MAX_CHUNK_TOKENS, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_CONFIG_DIR, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_DEBUG, OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_LOG_FORMAT. Set them in your MCP config before starting the server.
Node.js 18+ (runs with npx), plus an MCP client such as Claude Code, Codex, Claude Desktop or Cursor.
Obsidian Brain is a local MCP server distributed as the npm package obsidian-brain.
Run: claude mcp add obsidian-brain -e VAULT_PATH=... -e DATA_DIR=... -e EMBEDDING_PRESET=... -e EMBEDDING_MODEL=... -e EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=... -e OLLAMA_BASE_URL=... -e OLLAMA_EMBEDDING_DIM=... -e OLLAMA_NUM_CTX=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_AUTO_PULL=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_BYOM_AUTO_PULL=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_WATCH=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_CATCHUP=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_WATCH_DEBOUNCE_MS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_COMMUNITY_DEBOUNCE_MS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_TOOL_TIMEOUT_MS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_MAX_CHUNK_TOKENS=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_CONFIG_DIR=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_DEBUG=... -e OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_LOG_FORMAT=... -- npx -y obsidian-brain
Run: codex mcp add obsidian-brain --env VAULT_PATH=... --env DATA_DIR=... --env EMBEDDING_PRESET=... --env EMBEDDING_MODEL=... --env EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=... --env OLLAMA_BASE_URL=... --env OLLAMA_EMBEDDING_DIM=... --env OLLAMA_NUM_CTX=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_AUTO_PULL=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_OLLAMA_BYOM_AUTO_PULL=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_WATCH=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_NO_CATCHUP=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_WATCH_DEBOUNCE_MS=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_COMMUNITY_DEBOUNCE_MS=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_TOOL_TIMEOUT_MS=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_MAX_CHUNK_TOKENS=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_CONFIG_DIR=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_DEBUG=... --env OBSIDIAN_BRAIN_LOG_FORMAT=... -- npx -y obsidian-brain
Similar MCP servers
NameStars
- Obsidian Hybrid Searchio.github.flowing-abyss/obsidian-hybrid-search106
- seekstoneio.github.shaqmughal/seekstone29
- Obsidian Everywhereio.github.junnnnnw00/obsidian-everywhere15
- Firecrawl MCP Serverio.github.firecrawl/firecrawl-mcp-server7,526
- socraticodeio.github.giancarloerra/socraticode3,322
- arxiv-mcp-serverio.github.blazickjp/arxiv-mcp-server3,177
- mcp-neo4j-memoryio.github.neo4j-contrib/mcp-neo4j-memory985
- Octocodeio.github.Muvon/octocode478