Obsidian + Claude Code: The Complete Integration Guide

TL;DR: Integrate Obsidian with Claude Code using 5 strategies: dedicated developer vault with symlinks ( ln -s ~/vault/notes ./docs ), vault-as-repo with .obsidianignore filtering, MCP bridges for direct vault access, Obsidian plugins (Smart Connections, Copilot), and community-tested workflows. Symlinks are the simplest — one command gives Claude Code read access to your knowledge base. Obsidian and Claude Code are two of the most powerful tools in a developer's toolkit right now — but using them together isn't obvious. Claude Code generates markdown files constantly (plans, memory, CLAUDE.md configs), and Obsidian is the best markdown editor on the planet. The problem? If you open a code repo as an Obsidian vault, you get PNGs, JavaScript files, JSON configs, and node_modules cluttering your file explorer. I researched blog posts, Twitter threads, YouTube videos, GitHub repos, and Obsidian forum discussions to compile every strategy the community has found. This guide covers five dis