Install
Nectenda for Obsidian

Real-time collaboration on a server that cannot read your notes

Live cursors and shared editing in your notes, canvases and bases, in your own vault, where the server carrying every keystroke holds only ciphertext it has no key for.

Install Nectenda in Obsidian

No Obsidian on this device? See Nectenda in the community directory

Recording: in one Obsidian note, Tomás’s named pointer and caret edit beside yours, and his caret stays marked at the edge when you scroll away. Then on a canvas, you both move, resize, link and type in cards at the same time. Then in a base’s kanban view, he moves a card to another lane while you work on another, and each of you sees which card the other is on.
Two people in one note, on one canvas, then in one base. Their names travel with their cursors, and the server between them holds only ciphertext.

The softest binding

Sync is a service, not a hold. Your notes stay plain markdown files on your own disk. If the service stops, the price changes, or you simply leave, your vault is untouched.

A server that cannot read you

Notes are encrypted on your device with a key derived from a password we never receive. Document names are HMACs rather than paths, so filenames do not reach us either.

Checkable, not just claimed

The plugin ships as readable JavaScript — the file that runs is the file you can inspect. Every release carries the SHA-256 of that file and the source it was built from.

Notes

See where everyone is, as they type

Everyone in a note has a caret and a pointer with their name on it. Edits merge character by character, so two people typing in one paragraph both keep every word. Scroll away from someone and their caret waits at the edge of the screen.

Guide: Editing together

Recording: Tomás’s named pointer and caret in a note, typing beside yours.

Canvases

Work on one board at once

Cards moved, resized, linked and typed in show for everyone as they happen, with each person’s pointer and selection drawn in their colour. Changes to different cards merge instead of one person’s copy replacing the other’s, and a note shown in a card is live too, with everyone’s cursors, as in its own pane.

Guide: Canvases together

Recording: on a canvas, Tomás moves, resizes and links cards while you work beside him.

Bases

Bases that merge, kanban view included

Two people changing different filters, formulas or views of one base both keep their change. You see who has the base open and which row, cell or card they are on, and in the kanban view Obsidian 1.14 adds, cards moved between lanes merge too.

Guide: Bases together

Recording: in a base, Tomás’s outline on the row he is on, then a card moved between lanes of its kanban view.

Community plugins

Kanban boards and Excalidraw drawings, live

Boards made with the Kanban plugin update for everyone as cards move, and show which card each person is editing. Drawings made with the Excalidraw plugin merge shape by shape, with everyone’s pointer on the canvas, and when two people change one shape’s text or style at once, the losing change is kept beside it, labelled with who made it. Images in a drawing are attachments, so they sync on plans with attachment storage.

Guide: Kanban boards together · Excalidraw drawings together

Recording: a Kanban plugin board, with Tomás moving a card between lanes and his outline on the card he edits.
Recording: an Excalidraw drawing, with Tomás’s named pointer drawing and moving shapes beside yours.

Offline

Keep working when the connection goes

Your notes are files on your own disk, so a train or a basement changes nothing about writing. What you change offline is kept on your device and merges with everyone else’s when you reconnect.

Guide: Sync status icons

Recording: your connection goes and the Nectenda icon turns grey; you keep writing, Tomás writes too, and when you are back each has the other’s line.

Pricing

Collaboration you pay for. Privacy you don't.

Billing

Paying for the year saves 17–20%. Same plan, same terms.

Switch to annual to pay less for the same plan.

Free

$0 per month

free forever, no bills

  • 3 seats
  • 2 devices per seat
  • Text sync only — no attachments

Not a reduced version of a paid plan, and it does not expire. Every live-collaboration feature is included; only seats, devices and storage differ. A collaboration tool whose free tier only fits one person cannot demonstrate the only thing it does.

Open in Obsidian

Personal

$4 per month $5 per month

billed $48 a year billed monthly

  • 6 seats
  • 3 devices per seat
  • 10 GB of attachments

For one person and the people they write with.

Upgrade in Obsidian

Team

Most chosen

$5 per seat / month $6 per seat / month

billed $60 a seat a year billed monthly

  • Up to 10 seats
  • 4 devices per seat
  • 20 GB, plus 5 GB per seat

Buy the seats you need; the storage follows them.

Upgrade in Obsidian

Small Business

$15 per seat / month $18 per seat / month

billed $180 a seat a year billed monthly

  • Up to 25 seats
  • 6 devices per seat
  • 100 GB, plus 20 GB per seat

Past 25 seats, talk to us.

Upgrade in Obsidian

Included on every plan, Free too

  • Live carets and named pointers in notes
  • Shared editing in notes, merged as you type
  • Live canvases: cards moved, resized, linked and typed in together
  • Bases that merge, with the kanban view
  • Live boards in the community Kanban plugin
  • Live drawings in the community Excalidraw plugin (images in them need attachment storage)
  • Offline editing that merges when you reconnect

The price here is the price you pay. Creem is the merchant of record and handles any VAT, sales tax or GST due where you are.

Every plan, compared

What it does not claim

It has not been audited. It is designed to be — publishing the client is the whole point — but no external review has been carried out, and saying otherwise would be the kind of claim this project exists to avoid.

It does not hide metadata. The server can see that you have an account, who you share folders with, how much you store and when you were connected. Traffic analysis is real, and encryption does not solve it.

dum novella vinea est, quam mollissimo nectenda est

While the vine is young, it must be tied with the softest possible binding.

Columella, De Re Rustica IV.13