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Yes—provided the note app, AI model and any speech-transcription model are installed on your device and configured to run locally. Notes opening offline does not prove that the assistant’s AI works offline: an app can store notes on your device but send prompts to a cloud service. Test each feature with networking disabled before relying on it.
What “offline” means for notes and AI
There are two separate questions: can you read your notes without internet, and can the assistant process them without internet? Obsidian says its notes are stored locally and remain accessible offline; syncing is an additional feature, not a prerequisite for local access. Its [Sync service](https://help.obsidian.md/sync-notes) uses an off-site remote vault while keeping a local copy on each device.
AI generation needs a model and an inference path. For offline use, the model must be on the device and the note app must send requests to a local runtime rather than a hosted API. A local notebook connected to a cloud AI provider can still require internet, even when every note is stored on the device.
What must be installed before you disconnect?
A locally stored notebook
Choose a note app that keeps the relevant notes on the device. Obsidian describes this offline access in its guide to syncing notes across devices. If you depend on sync, remember that keeping a local copy and synchronizing changes between devices are different jobs: sync typically needs a connection when you want changes to reach other devices.
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A local AI runtime and downloaded model
Ollama documents a local API at http://localhost:11434. Requests sent to this local endpoint can use a model downloaded onto the device; requests sent to a cloud provider are a different path and require connectivity. See Ollama’s API introduction.
Install the runtime and download the model while online. Ollama’s quickstart gives Gemma 4 E2B as an example: its download is about 7.2 GB, and Ollama recommends 8 GB of available VRAM or unified memory for that example. These are model-specific setup figures, not universal minimums. Hardware needs vary, and a larger context window requires more memory.
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Local transcription, if you use voice notes
Voice capture has its own processing path. Obsidian’s Speech Kit and Voice Scribe community-plugin listings describe on-device or local transcription options. Check the particular plugin and settings rather than assuming every voice feature is local: a plugin may use a hosted transcription provider, and a local transcript may still be sent to a cloud model for summarization. The listings are Speech Kit and Voice Scribe.
How to verify the complete workflow
- While online, install the note app, local runtime and chosen models. Configure the assistant to use the local runtime endpoint, such as
http://localhost:11434, instead of a hosted API. - If you use voice notes, select a transcription option explicitly described as on-device or local. Check the summarization setting separately; transcription and summarization can use different providers.
- Disconnect the device from Wi-Fi and mobile data, or otherwise disable its network access.
- Try the tasks you actually need: open and search notes, generate a response from a note, transcribe a new recording, summarize it, and export the result if required.
- Restore connectivity and check any workflows that depend on sync or external content retrieval. Do not treat a successful offline generation as proof that these secondary features work without a connection.
This is a practical verification procedure, not a claim that a particular app-and-device combination has been tested here. A feature that fails while disconnected may be using an online provider, may not have its model downloaded, or may rely on a separate network-dependent service.
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Which features may still use the internet?
“Local AI” does not necessarily mean the whole app is offline-only. Network use depends on the services and features enabled. Obsidian notes that network calls vary by services used and features enabled in its security considerations for teams.
For example, the Synapse community-plugin listing describes link-related enrichment that may fetch third-party pages and a caption-first transcription flow that requests YouTube pages. Those functions can need internet even if another part of the assistant uses a local model. Review the provider and feature settings in the Synapse listing.
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What you give up or need to check with a local setup
- Device capacity: The selected model and its context length must fit available memory. Ollama’s 8 GB recommendation applies to its Gemma 4 E2B example, not every model.
- Speed and output quality: They depend on the model and device. The cited setup documentation does not establish that local models match cloud models, or provide device-specific speed or transcription-accuracy benchmarks.
- Data path: A local model can keep inference on-device, but only if the app and relevant plugin actually route requests locally. Check transcription, summarization, web enrichment and sync separately.
- Secondary features: Web fetching, YouTube caption retrieval and cross-device synchronization can require connectivity even when notes and AI generation are available offline.
Before choosing between local and cloud processing, compare the exact features you need: offline operation, whether note text or audio is transmitted, model and context size for your available memory, language support and accuracy evidence for transcription, speed on your device, and connectivity needs for secondary features. The cited documentation does not provide a direct performance comparison.
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