Logseq

Logseq is an outliner-style note app that stores everything as plain Markdown or Org-mode files on your own disk and links blocks bidirectionally, which is why researchers, developers and students who dislike lock-in gravitate to it. The desktop and mobile apps are free and open source under AGPL-3.0, with no account needed.

What the free plan gives you

There is no free plan as such: the whole application is free. You get the outliner, daily journal pages, block references and backlinks, a graph view, PDF annotation, task management, flashcards and whiteboards. A plugin and theme ecosystem extends it, and because your graph is a folder of text files you can sync it yourself with Git, iCloud, Syncthing or any file sync tool. Apps run on Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS and Android, and there are no page, block or device limits.

Where the free plan stops

The one paid piece is Logseq Sync, the project's own end-to-end encrypted sync service, offered to backers and sponsors. Third-party listings quote it at around $5 a month, but that price is not confirmed on a vendor page as of this check. Everything else, including self-managed sync, stays free. The other practical limit is that the newer database version of Logseq is still rolling out across platforms, so some features differ between file-based and DB graphs.

Who it suits

If you want a local-first second brain and are comfortable sorting out sync yourself, Logseq costs nothing indefinitely. If you need shared workspaces, real-time collaboration or a polished mobile sync experience out of the box, Obsidian Sync or a hosted tool may be less friction.