Why Wenlan
I started Wenlan because my notes, documents, and AI chats were scattered, and keeping a note system from rotting took constant upkeep. Since then we keep hearing the same about Obsidian: too much setup, with plugins to find, install, and keep updated. Wenlan is for people who use AI tools every day and don't want to maintain a note system.
Personal: download the desktop app and use it on your own.
Teams (in the next release): a self-hosted Wenlan server everyone connects to, with view-only or edit access for each person.
- Keeps itself up to date. Your AI tools save what you decide in chats as memories and fold them into pages. When a source changes, the pages that rely on it get updated.
- No plugins, no setup. Connect all in Settings connects your AI tools in one click. No plugins to find or update, and no API keys.
- Bring what you have. Obsidian vaults, notes, documents, and AI chats. Full list.
- You decide what AI changes. See every change, undo it, and choose which pages wait for your OK.
- Pages cite their sources. A citation opens the original; a page whose citations mostly don't match isn't saved.
- A page can be text or HTML. Ask your AI to make an HTML view of any page, or keep the HTML it made as an HTML page of its own. An HTML view shows the page's live text, so you never redo it.
- Share a Space. With a colleague, or across your own computers, through a Google Drive or iCloud Drive folder.
How it compares
| Obsidian + plugins | Notion | LLM wiki apps | Wenlan |
|---|
| Who organizes | You, with plugins | You, or Notion's agents | An AI you set up | Your AI tools; updates when a source changes |
| Setup | Find and update plugins | Full AI on the Business plan | Model key or scheduled routine | One click, no API key |
| Checks the AI's work | Depends on the plugin | Cites sources; no match check | Links to sources | Refuses pages whose citations don't match |
| What AI may change | Depends on the plugin | Pages you give an agent | Its wiki folder | You choose per page; restore anytime |
| Where notes live | Your computer | Notion's cloud | Your computer | Your computer; works with your vault |
Get started
1. Download and open Wenlan
Download the desktop app for macOS 11 or later on Apple Silicon, Windows x64, or Linux x64 (AppImage or .deb, from v0.22). The app is in English, 简体中文, and 繁體中文.
Prefer the terminal? On a Mac, run npx -y wenlan setup, or brew install 7xuanlu/tap/wenlan and then wenlan setup. Linux and Windows: CLI install guide.
2. Bring in your material
Create a page, or bring in an Obsidian vault, a Logseq graph, a folder, or earlier AI chats. Import guide.
3. Connect your AI tool
In the App's Settings, Add a tool finds the AI tools on your computer and Connect all sets them up in one press. There is nothing else to install or keep updated. Then start a new AI session and ask:
/wenlan what did I decide about this before? Then help me: …
/wenlan ($wenlan in Codex) is the one command to remember: say what you want after it.
Works with Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Codex, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, VS Code, Gemini CLI, Windsurf, Grok Bot, and other MCP tools. Set one up by hand.
When an import finishes, the app offers Write pages with your AI tool to turn it into your first cited pages. No command needed.
What you can bring in
- Files and folders: Markdown, text, text-based PDFs, and DOCX. Import once, or keep a folder in sync.
- Obsidian vaults and Logseq graphs: keep them in sync, or import once. Notes you wrote start on Ask me first.
- Web links: paste a link into a page and it becomes a source. YouTube, X, Threads, Instagram, and RedNote links show as a card or video.
- Gmail, Notion, Google Drive, Slack, GitHub: your AI tool reads them with its own connectors and saves what matters, with a link to the original.
- AI chats: decisions and findings are saved as memories, not full transcripts. ChatGPT and Claude export ZIPs work too.
- A code repository:
/wenlan wiki writes pages tied to the code. Code wiki.
You can also connect an Open Knowledge Format (OKF) folder as a source. Scanned PDFs need text extraction first; chat attachments are not imported. Import guide.
How it stays organized
Your AI tool reads what you bring in and writes it into Markdown pages. It links related pages, cites where each sentence came from, and brings pages up to date when a source changes. You can open any page and write in it yourself.
This is the beginning of the README. Read the rest at the original. Read the full README ↗
