Give Claude a Standing Memory with Claude Code and Obsidian

A chat with Claude is, by default, a clean slate. Close the window and open a new one, and whatever you explained about your job, your team, or the project you're mid-way through is gone. For a quick question that's fine. For anyone trying to use Claude the way they'd use a capable assistant who sticks around, it means re-explaining your whole situation over and over, which gets old fast and quietly discourages you from using it for the bigger, ongoing stuff.

The fix isn't a feature Claude ships with. It's a habit, built on files. Claude Code, Anthropic's command-line coding tool, can read and write plain text files in a folder on your computer, and it reads certain files automatically at the start of a session. If those files hold the facts worth remembering, written in plain language, Claude effectively remembers them too, every time, without you retyping anything.

Obsidian is the other half. It's a free note-taking app built around one idea that matters a lot here: everything you write in it is stored as ordinary text files in a folder, not locked inside a proprietary database somewhere. That's exactly the shape of thing Claude Code can open, read, and edit directly, which is why the two pair so naturally even though neither was designed with the other in mind.

What follows is the whole setup: installing Claude Code, creating an Obsidian vault, building a small folder and file structure Claude reads every session, and then handing the upkeep to a couple of scheduled routines so the system stays current without becoming a new chore on your list.

Obsidian is free to download and use, and setting up a vault, which is just Obsidian's word for a folder it manages, takes under a minute. Download it from its own site if you haven't already, then open the vault switcher. That's the small icon in the bottom-left corner of the app, or you can reach the same menu through the command palette by searching for "Open another vault."

Choose "Create new vault." You'll be asked for a name: type Brain. Then use the Browse button to pick where it lives on your computer; choose your Documents folder, so the vault sits somewhere you'd find it without thinking. Click Create, and Obsidian opens the new, empty vault.

That's the whole setup on Obsidian's side. The vault is, underneath the app's interface, nothing more than a folder named Brain inside Documents, full of plain .md text files once you start adding to it. That plainness is the entire point: Claude Code can open that same folder directly and treat it as any other project folder on your computer, reading and editing the files inside it the same way it would code in a software project.

Keep the vault open in Obsidian while you work through the rest of this guide, so you can see the folders and files appear as Claude Code creates them in the next step.

You don't have to build any of this by hand. With the Brain vault open in Obsidian and a terminal open in that same folder, run claude to start a session, then paste the setup prompt below as your very first message. It tells Claude Code exactly which folders and files to create, and instructs it to interview you first rather than guessing at the details.

The interview matters more than the folder structure does. A CLAUDE.md written from a template is generic; one written from ten honest answers about your role, your main projects, the people you work with, how you make decisions, and how you want daily notes captured is actually useful from day one.

Answer plainly and specifically. "I manage a five-person support team and report to the VP of Ops" does far more for Claude than "I work in management." The more concrete your answers, the less Claude has to guess later, which is the entire reason this setup exists in the first place.