Have you ever found yourself frantically searching for a crucial piece of information that feels like the missing piece in your project proposal? It could be a game changer, but it’s hiding somewhere in the endless sea of notes and documents scattered across your devices.
We’ve all been there. And that’s where personal knowledge base software comes in.
I started my journey to streamline knowledge management after one too many instances of being unable to track important information on my projects. My team and I at ClickUp tested many solutions, and based on what we found, I’m happy to share a list of the 10 best personal knowledge base software in the market today.
What Should You Look for in Personal Knowledge Base Software?
If you want to store, organize, and manage information in a structured way, personal knowledge management tools will make a difference.
An ideal personal knowledge base software should have the following features:
- Search function: The software must let you quickly locate information through keywords, tags, or other advanced filters
- Organization options: Flexible features such as categories, folders, and tags help organize your information in a way that can be tracked down easily
- Integration: Your internal knowledge base will be more effective if it can integrate with other tools and software, such as task management applications, emails, and calendars
- Collaboration options: You might need to collaborate with a colleague or a friend to accomplish a task using your personal knowledge management software. Ensure the software has rich collaboration options such as shared workspaces and version control
- Privacy and security: The software should be able to hold any type of data, from personal to professional. Ensure the tool is equipped with security features such as encryption and user identification
- Ease of use: The personal knowledge management tool must have an intuitive interface and should make it easy to organize, search, and retrieve information with minimal steps
Now that we know the basic requirements for choosing a personal knowledge management tool, let’s explore the top options!
The 10 Best Personal Knowledge Base Software to Use
Here are the 10 best personal knowledge base software options based on my research. We’ve covered each tool’s best features, pricing, and limitations.
1. ClickUp (Best AI-powered knowledge base)
ClickUp, a dynamic, cloud-based project management software, lets you create a personalized knowledge base to store everything, from a thought or link to an image or video.
With ClickUp Docs, you can create documents or wikis featuring nested pages, versatile styling options, and customizable templates. You can also organize your resources, create listicles, add tables or charts, and stylize your content with various fonts and sizes.
That’s not all! Collaboration is easy—edit in real-time with your team, use tags in comments, assign action items, and convert text into trackable tasks to keep ideas organized. Additionally, you can protect your documents with privacy settings, manage permissions, and create shareable links.
Hear it straight from a customer on why they prefer ClickUp:
Since adopting ClickUp our teams have slowly migrated away from Google Docs for documentation, and in fact, documentation has improved significantly.
Since adopting ClickUp our teams have slowly migrated away from Google Docs for documentation, and in fact, documentation has improved significantly.
Want to make your knowledge base more powerful and efficient? Integrate ClickUp Brain and welcome advanced features and functionalities.
ClickUp Brain is excellent for advanced searches and retrieval through natural language processing and semantic search. ClickUp Brain consolidates all your AI applications and simplifies the integration of tasks, documents, people, and knowledge into your workflow.
For example, imagine you’re searching for an apt case study to strengthen your business proposal. Here, you can leverage advanced AI tools for knowledge management to find relevant case studies from your knowledge base software.
ClickUp Brain also summarizes long-form documents and suggests relevant content based on your activities. Additionally, with its assistance, you can analyze trends and patterns in your knowledge base and develop knowledge management strategies.
Sometimes, you might not have the time to organize all your resources manually. That’s where the ClickUp Knowledge Base Template comes in, making it easier to build your knowledge base quickly.
With this knowledge base template, you can:
- Store and share in-house knowledge in a structured way within your team or company
- Segregate information into specific types of sections, such as FAQs, knowledge articles, and resources, making it easier to retrieve data
- Create a help center experience for team members to promote collaboration
ClickUp best features
- Customize categories into different levels, such as spaces, folders, and lists, to organize your knowledge base
- Create comprehensive documents to store information and link to ClickUp Tasks and subtasks for easy navigation
- Search efficiently with global search and advanced filters like ClickUp Custom Status and ClickUp Custom Fields
- Use rich edit and formatting options to make a visually appealing knowledge base with markdown, tables, and embedded files
- Access knowledge base on the go with ClickUp’s mobile application
- Leverage ClickUp Integrations to integrate seamlessly with tools like Google Drive, Dropbox, Slack, and more to centralize your knowledge base
ClickUp limitations
- ClickUp has so many features and customization options that it can take a while to configure it perfectly for your needs
- ClickUp AI is only available with the paid plans
ClickUp pricing
- Free Forever
- Unlimited: $7/month per user
- Business: $12/month per user
- Enterprise: Contact for pricing
- ClickUp Brain: Add to any paid plan for $7 per Workspace member per month
ClickUp ratings and reviews
- G2: 4. 7/5 (9,000+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4. 6/5 (4,000+ reviews)
2. Notion (Best for organizing your knowledge base creatively)
Notion offers an intuitive solution for managing notes and documents with its simple and powerful data storage method: Wikis.
You can look at all the pages in your workspace with the sidebar and use powerful search filters to locate content within seconds. It lets you use emojis, cover images, or any form of media to make your knowledge base lively, convenient, and fun.
Notion best features
- Create an organized and interconnected knowledge base by linking your notes and documents to other pages
- Update similar content in all places at once with synced blocks
- Simplify creating a knowledge base with Notion templates tailored for different purposes
- Write and organize better with an integrated AI assistant
Notion limitations
- Notion has multiple features so many users report a learning curve when using it
- The software does not provide a seamless mobile or iPad experience
Notion pricing
- Free: $0
- Plus: $12/seat per month
- Business: $18/seat per month
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
Notion ratings and reviews
- G2: 4. 7/5 (5,400+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4. 7/5 (2,200+ reviews)
3. Evernote (Best for recording audio notes)
Whether you’re organizing your schedule or jotting down random thoughts, Evernote is a reliable note-taking and knowledge-sharing software that consolidates everything in one place. It lets you keep your information accessible 24/7.
You can enhance your notes by incorporating text, images, scans, PDFs, and documents, making them more versatile and useful.
Let me highlight one of its best features: audio notes. This is especially useful on busy days when you don’t have the time to write down your thoughts and ideas.
Evernote best features
- Instantly locate information with advanced search filters and AI writing tools
- Access your knowledge base even without an internet connection to stay on top of your tasks at all times
- Organize your resources, such as images, scans, recipes, PDFs, etc.
Evernote limitations
- Frequent updates to the software make it difficult for customers to keep up with the changes
Evernote pricing
- Free
- Personal: $14. 99/month
- Professional: $17. 99/month
Evernote ratings and reviews
- G2: 4. 4/5 (2,000+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4. 4/5 (8,200+ reviews)
4. Mem (Best for self-organizing your knowledge base)
Mem is a self-organizing personal knowledge management tool for entrepreneurs, executives, researchers, and creators. This is ideal if you have a high volume of knowledge resources that you need frequently.
Mem chat can help you find answers to your questions, summarize meeting notes, and generate content by understanding your notes.
In addition to locating what you ask for in Mem chat, it also shows related notes. You do not have to organize this knowledge base manually. Simply search for what you need; AI-generated results will show all the resources and notes related to a particular task.
Mem best features
- Rediscover past notes on the same subject for complete access to everything on a specific topic
- Access notes from across your knowledge base without the need to recall your tagging system or complex folder structure
- Enhance your functioning with AI suggestions for documentation to accelerate tasks
Mem limitations
- The software offers limited offline functionality in its search feature, so AI assistance is dependent on internet connectivity
Mem pricing
- Mem: $14. 99/month
- Mem Teams: Custom pricing
Mem ratings and reviews
- G2: Not enough reviews and ratings
- Capterra: Not enough reviews and ratings
5. Obsidian (Best for creating a visually interconnected knowledge base)
Obsidian is a private and flexible app that adapts to your thinking and organizes your thoughts for you. You can store anything in this knowledge base because it keeps your writing safe.
The software provides hundreds of plugins and themes to shape Obsidian to fit your thinking. That’s not all; interactive graphs allow you to visualize the relationships and patterns in your notes.
Its most distinguishing factor is that it uses open, non-proprietary files, so you’re never locked in and can preserve your data and thoughts for perpetuity.
Obsidian best features
- Build a record from personal notes or journal entries with Obsidian’s wide variety of tools
- Connect notes, ideas, people, and places within your knowledge base
- Publish your notes instantly to turn them into an online wiki, knowledge base, documentation, or digital garden
Obsidian limitations
- Navigating between different notes can be slow, sometimes causing a delay in accessing important information
Obsidian pricing
- Personal Use: Free
- Commercial Use: $50/user per year
Obsidian ratings and reviews
- G2: No ratings available
- Capterra: 4. 9/5 (20+ reviews)
6. Roam Research (Best for building an interconnected knowledge base)
Working on Roam is like working with a smart, visual database. It lets you create a pool for all your research in one place before you begin organizing it.
The best feature of this software is that it presents your information in an associative manner rather than a hierarchical one.
That’s why it’s trusted by researchers, writers, developers, designers, product managers, and other professionals.
Roam Research’s best features
- Build an expansive and networked personal knowledge base through its associative note-building approach
- Create and store information in a graph structure for simplified referencing and revisiting
- Organize your thoughts and search through them for quick access
Roam Research limitations
- The software offers limited note-taking features and has a very simple user interface
Roam Research pricing
- Pro: $15/month
- Believer: $8. 33/month
Roam Research ratings and reviews
- G2: No ratings available
- Capterra: Not enough reviews
7. Document360 (Best for a customizable knowledge base)
Do you wish to create a customized personal knowledge base? Document360 might be the right choice if you want to include your brand colors and add a custom domain.
Like other software tools on this list, Document360 has an AI-powered search engine to scan the knowledge base to provide context-sensitive results in milliseconds.
Additionally, you can choose from different access control options and turn your knowledge base from private to public with a click.
Document360 best features
- Get insights from the viewers through feedback and ratings and combine this with analytics to enhance your knowledge base
- Integrate comments, chats, and analytics to make your knowledge base a single data source
- Access your knowledge base anytime and from anywhere with information at your fingertips
Document360 limitations
- Some software features are available only through add-ons that can add to the software cost
Document360 pricing
- Free Forever
- Standard: $149/project per month (billed annually)
- Professional: $299/project per month (billed annually)
- Business: $399/project per month (billed annually)
- Enterprise: $599/project per month (billed annually)
Document360 ratings and reviews
- G2: 4. 7/5 (400+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4. 7/5 (200+ reviews)
8. Confluence (Best for a multi-format knowledge base)
Confluence uses formats such as page trees and tables of contents to locate important information while offering advanced search features.
It allows you to organize your knowledge base in pages, attachments, and spaces with labels. You can also create and scan through a team knowledge base to filter the best ideas.
Confluence best features
- Co-edit with teams in real time and publish updates that highlight changes
- Leave in-line and page comments, likes, and visual elements, such as images, GIFs, and emojis
- Alert your teammates when you tag them or assign a task so everyone stays on top of their work
Confluence limitations
- The resource center of the software is sometimes lacking, making it difficult to understand the customization features
Confluence pricing
- Free
- Standard: $4. 89/user per month
- Premium: $8. 97/user per month
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
Confluence ratings and reviews
- G2: 4. 1/5 (3,000+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4. 5/5 (3,000+ reviews)
9. HappyFox (Best for a well-structured knowledge base)
HappyFox provides a structured index to help you find what you need without wasting time. The tool assists you in finding the right information and offers relevant suggestions.
With its customization options, your knowledge base can look visually appealing. Plus, you can effortlessly create articles and sections and embed images/videos to have all resources in one place.
HappyFox best features
- Benefit from real-time tracking and feedback by collaborating with others on your knowledge base
- Personalize your knowledge base with customized headers, layout, colors, and logos
- Transform your static single-page FAQ section into a well-done knowledge base
HappyFox limitations
- The pricing structure of the software can be costly for small businesses
HappyFox pricing
- Basic: $14/agent per month
- Team: $69/agent per month
- Pro: $199/agent per month
- Enterprise PRO: Custom pricing
HappyFox ratings and reviews
- G2: 4. /5 (200+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4. 6/5 (90+ reviews)
10. Bloks (Best for template-driven knowledge management)
Bloks works with Zoom, Meet, Teams, Slack, and other platforms. It lets you record meeting minutes and note key ideas in your knowledge base to revisit later.
Bloks enhances clarity and context by revolutionizing how you capture, organize, and bring your thoughts to the forefront.
What sets this software apart is its ability to create tailored briefs for various purposes, enabling you to formally present your ideas with precision.
Bloks best features
- Jot down important meeting details and notes automatically by using AI as your personal assistant
- Categorize your resources based on requirements with varied formats
- Use templates to store information based on your context and create your customized template for later use
Bloks limitations
- It does not allow access without a phone or desktop app
Bloks pricing
- Bloks Free: Up to 10 credits
- Bloks+: $29/month
- Bloks Enterprise: Custom pricing
Bloks ratings and reviews
- G2: No ratings available
- Capterra: Not enough reviews
Create a Powerful Personal Knowledge Base with ClickUp
A well-organized personal knowledge base with advanced search capabilities is an invaluable asset. It serves as a foundation for developing ideas and accessing necessary resources when you and team need them. You can also use it to turn personal ideas and notes spread across disparate channels into a shared, actionable knowledge base.
When it comes to ease-of-use and exceptional functionality, ClickUp is your best option. ClickUp Docs, coupled with its AI assistant Brain, enhances organization and optimizes resource retrieval. It boosts your productivity, saves you time, and streamline your professional and personal work.
Sign up for ClickUp today to build your dynamic personal knowledge base.