Easiest way to share a note on Obsidian - Obsius Publish plugin
Based on Nicole van der Hoeven's video on YouTube. If you like this content, support the original creators by watching, liking and subscribing to their content.
Obsius Publish generates a shareable URL for individual Obsidian notes, making it ideal for quick “send to a few people” sharing.
Briefing
Obsius Publish offers an easy, free way to share individual Obsidian notes online via a hard-to-guess URL—useful for “send this to a few people” moments, but not a true privacy solution. Unlike Obsidian Publish (the paid, fully featured sharing service), Obsius Publish is a third-party, free, open-source community plugin designed for one-off notes that don’t need the full public publishing experience.
The core workflow is straightforward. After installing Obsius Publish from Obsidian’s community plugin browser and enabling it, users get new commands in the Command Palette. Publishing a note is done by running “publish to Obsius,” which generates a URL that can be copied to the clipboard. A practical tip is to store that URL back into the note itself (e.g., in a custom property like “Obsius URL”) so the link can be reused later. Clicking the generated link opens a public web page containing the note’s content, including embedded elements such as iframes and links.
Updates and removals are also supported, but with small quirks. After publishing, users can run an “Update in Obsius” command to push changes. In testing, the update sometimes returns a failure message even though the content still updates correctly—an error that appears to be messaging-only rather than functional. To revoke access, users can run “Remove from Obsius,” after which the page returns a 404 Not Found on refresh, indicating it has been deleted from the Obsius server. A separate command lists all currently published posts, helping users prune what they’ve shared.
The plugin’s limitations shape when it’s appropriate. It’s built for individual pages rather than a connected publishing site: WikiLinks or internal markdown links won’t automatically become clickable on Obsius because the plugin doesn’t parse and match published pages into a navigable graph. If multiple notes are published, linking to them on Obsius requires using the external URL instead of Obsidian’s internal link format. There’s also no bulk publishing or automatic table-of-contents style navigation—each page must be published individually.
Privacy is handled through “security through obscurity,” not access control. Anyone who has the URL can view the note, so sensitive material shouldn’t be included. The creator’s own caution includes testing whether the plugin reads other notes: developer tools showed that requests appear to send only the exact content of the selected note (not the rest of the vault), though users are still encouraged to do their own checks. Finally, because the service is free and run by a single developer funded by donations and coffee purchases, longevity is uncertain; links shouldn’t be treated as mission-critical. Overall, Obsius Publish is best viewed as a lightweight, temporary sharing mechanism for notes meant to be read once or twice by a small audience—not as a secure private document vault.
Cornell Notes
Obsius Publish is a free, open-source Obsidian community plugin that turns a single note into a shareable web page using a hard-to-guess URL. It’s designed for quick, semi-private sharing to a small group, not for fully private documents or large-scale publishing. Users publish via the Command Palette, copy/store the generated URL, and can later update or remove the note (removal leads to a 404). The plugin doesn’t automatically convert Obsidian internal links (WikiLinks) into clickable links on Obsius, and it lacks bulk publishing or automatic navigation features. Because anyone with the URL can access the content and the service depends on one developer, users should avoid sensitive or mission-critical information.
How does Obsius Publish share a note, and what does the generated URL imply for privacy?
What commands are used to publish, update, and revoke a note, and what quirks show up in practice?
Why don’t Obsidian internal links automatically work between published notes on Obsius?
What publishing features are missing compared with a more full-fledged publishing service?
What security concerns should users consider before publishing, and what did the transcript’s testing suggest?
Why might Obsius Publish be a poor fit for mission-critical sharing?
Review Questions
- What privacy model does Obsius Publish use, and how does that affect what kinds of notes you should publish?
- How do you update and remove a published note, and what outcome should you expect after removal?
- What limitations exist around internal links (WikiLinks/markdown) when multiple notes are published to Obsius?
Key Points
- 1
Obsius Publish generates a shareable URL for individual Obsidian notes, making it ideal for quick “send to a few people” sharing.
- 2
Anyone with the URL can view the note, so it’s not a true private sharing system and shouldn’t be used for sensitive content.
- 3
Publishing, updating, and revoking are handled through Command Palette commands; removal results in a 404 Not Found page.
- 4
Internal Obsidian links (WikiLinks/markdown) don’t automatically become clickable on Obsius, so cross-note linking may require using external Obsius URLs.
- 5
The plugin lacks bulk publishing and automatic navigation features like a table of contents; each page is published individually.
- 6
Developer tools testing described in the transcript suggests update requests include only the selected note’s content, but users should still verify and choose a safer vault strategy.
- 7
Because the service is free and maintained by one developer, links shouldn’t be treated as mission-critical or guaranteed to last.