I think it’s time to close this feature request based on the Obsidian team’s responses as of late, such as this one
I’m certain the Obsidian team will not be implementing pen support for Obsidian. This is and will remain a plaintext note-taking app meant for programmers.
For those who are interested in an app that supports plain-text and drawing support, I would look at AFFiNE. They’re also open-source, unlike Obsidian.
That message is over a year old.
Generally, We don’t comment on what will or will not be implemented and when.
The only exception is the roadmap which contains a broad list of major new features to be implemented in the short or medium term.
I wouldn’t hold my breath for this being implemented, IMO. I’d look at AFFiNE if I were you. I’ve started looking at it and experimenting with it a little and I’m definitely going to make the switch from Obsidian after I finish my degree. Their whiteboard feature is better than Obsidian’s and you can easily switch from document-view to whiteboard/canvas-view without having to create a new canvas (you can be writing something in document-view and then switch to whiteboard-view right away). Also, they’re open-source (Obsidian is not) which is great and there’s no learning curve with the tool, you can use it right out-of-the-box, you don’t need to install a plugin for accomplishing “this” or “that.” Also, you can export your notes to Markdown and you can use the tool locally. They’re also very, very responsive to questions from their users (just check out their discord server). Anyways, if drawing support is very important to your workflow, I would look at AFFiNE which is what I’ve started to do.
It doesn’t matter, based on these responses and the lack of interest from the Obsidian team in general, I have a pretty good idea that handwriting will not be added to Obsidian. Obsidian will remain a glorified text editor and will not really venture into a true note-taking app because of its obsession with markdown
I don’t know, Obsidian is a really really solid product (it’s almost like Skyrim) and it has been here for some years already, maybe as a result of a well designed business model which has allowed them to stay in the market during all this time compared to others very promising projects which seem to have been fallen into oblivion, like Logseq. Im affraid this could be the case with the tool you’re mentioning as well, i think it’s very green yet to make any conclusions, but i respect other’s opinions
Now speaking of this feature, its such a shame that is not being implemented yet, but for the time being, in recent updates of the Excalidraw Plugin, Zsolt has achieved capabilities that have surpassed Canvas’s in my opinion, now you can get the best of both worlds and create cards that leverage all the features available in the Obsidian editor and at the same time use all the tools provided by excalidraw, and of course the Obsidian integration the plugin itself offers.
This current status of the plugin resembles to the amazing Logseq Whiteboards.
Of course this is not for handwritten due to the poor performance, but now you can achieve one of the things Canvas lacks, fast and frictionless thinking of your ideas.
It’s not perfect, but i recommend others give it a try and make your own conclusions
Not sure if you are still having this issue. I use Surface Pro with its pen and drawing/sketching on Excalidraw within Obsidian works absolutely beautifully!
Canvas has lots of potential but is still in its infancy. It can’t do different shapes properly, the text inside cards becomes illegible if you go for a low-zoom/bird’s eye view of the entire Canvas, there is no drawing support which is essential for brainstorming. It is simply superb that the creator of Excalidraw is supporting all this in Obsidian for free!
