Install Obsidian and create your vault

Lesson outcome

You will have Obsidian installed and a new, empty vault created and ready for use.

Why this matters in an agency

Your agency's knowledge is scattered across email threads, Google Docs, Slack messages, sticky notes, and your head. None of that is accessible to Claude Code. The vault changes that. It becomes the single place where your business knowledge lives as plain text files that Claude Code can read, search, and update. You are not building a note-taking system. You are building a knowledge layer that makes AI useful.

Inputs, tools, and prerequisites

A Mac or Windows computer with at least 500 MB of free disk space. An internet connection to download Obsidian. That is all.

Step-by-step walkthrough

Download Obsidian

Go to obsidian.md and click Download. The site will detect your operating system automatically.

On Mac, you will download a .dmg file. Open it and drag Obsidian to your Applications folder. On Windows, you will download an installer (.exe). Run it and follow the prompts. The default installation settings are fine.

Create a new vault

Open Obsidian. The first screen asks you to create or open a vault. Click "Create new vault."

Give your vault a name. Something simple and clear. "Agency" or "AgencyVault" or your company name works. Avoid spaces in the name if possible — use a dash or run the words together. This is not a strict requirement, but it makes things easier when Claude Code references the path later.

Choose where to store the vault. On Mac, your home folder or Documents folder is fine. On Windows, your Documents folder or user folder works. Pick somewhere you can find easily. You will need to tell Claude Code where this vault lives later in the course.

Click "Create." Obsidian opens your new, empty vault.

Quick orientation

You are looking at an empty Obsidian vault. Here is what you need to know right now:

The left sidebar shows your files and folders. Right now it is empty because the vault is empty. As you add notes, they appear here.

To create a note, press Ctrl+N (Windows) or Cmd+N (Mac). A new untitled note appears. Type a title at the top and start writing. That is it. Obsidian saves automatically.

Notes are stored as plain .md (Markdown) files on your computer. There is no cloud database. No proprietary format. If you open your vault folder in your file manager, you will see the .md files sitting there. This is important because it means Claude Code can read and write these files directly — they are just text files in a folder.

Do not install any plugins, themes, or community add-ons right now. You do not need them yet. A bare Obsidian installation is exactly what you want. You will use Claude Code to organize the vault later in Module 10. For now, you just need the vault to exist.

Create a test note

Create your first note and call it "Test Note." Write a sentence or two — anything. "This is my first note in my agency vault." Now close Obsidian, reopen it, and confirm the note is still there. This proves the vault is saving correctly.

Note the full path to your vault folder. You will need it in later lessons. On Mac, it looks something like /Users/yourname/Documents/AgencyVault. On Windows, it looks like C:\Users\yourname\Documents\AgencyVault. Write it down or copy it somewhere you can find it.

Failure modes and verification checks

The most common issue is choosing a vault location that is hard to find later, like a nested subfolder buried in Downloads. Pick a simple, top-level location. Verification: open your file manager (Finder on Mac, File Explorer on Windows), navigate to the vault folder, and confirm you can see the .md file for the test note you created. If the file is there, Obsidian is working.

Implementation checklist

• Download and install Obsidian.
• Create a new vault with a clear name.
• Note the full path to the vault folder.
• Create a test note and verify it saves as a .md file.
• Do not install any plugins or themes.

Immediate next action

Move to the next module. Your vault exists. That is all it needs to do right now.

Exercise

Open your file manager and navigate to the vault folder. Find the test note .md file. Open it with a basic text editor (TextEdit on Mac, Notepad on Windows). You will see the same text you typed in Obsidian, possibly with a bit of formatting. This confirms that Obsidian notes are just text files. Close the text editor without making changes. This exercise proves a simple but important point: nothing about your vault is locked inside Obsidian. It is all plain text. That is why Claude Code can work with it.