SoloMD vs Tolaria: Two Tauri-Based Markdown Editors

Quick answer: as of v4.6 SoloMD has built the whole knowledge-graph layer it used to lack — properties inspector, type-driven sidebar, typed relationships, a relationship graph, saved views, the Inbox workflow, and tldraw whiteboards — so the choice is no longer "structure vs. everything else." Pick SoloMD if you also want it on iPad / iOS / Android, write in Chinese / Japanese (GBK / Big5 / Shift-JIS auto-detect), need Pandoc / academic-citation export or file import, or want the agent-workflow layer (scheduled recipes, AutoGit accept/reject sandbox, replayable traces). Pick Tolaria if its BlockNote block editor is the thing you write in — that's its one remaining edge.

Both have converged hard: Tolaria earlier added Windows, built-in AI providers, multi-vault, and Traditional-Chinese UI; and the v4.6 update closes the gap from the other side — SoloMD now ships the seven structural features that were Tolaria-only through mid-2026. This page reflects the current state.

The 30-second verdict

Everything Tolaria ships — and where SoloMD stands

We went deep on Tolaria 2026.6.6: installed it, clicked through every menu, command, setting and panel, and read the source. Here is its complete feature & settings surface, grouped by area, with an honest ✅ / 🟡 / ❌ for SoloMD on every line. Nothing hidden — and as of the 4.6 update the once Tolaria-only structural rows (properties, types, relationships, graph, views, Inbox, whiteboards) now read ✅ here too.

Editor & writing

Vault, files & organization

Git & version control

AI & agents

Export & interoperability

UI, platforms & polish

Tolaria's settings, one by one

Every preference Tolaria exposes (Settings → eight sections), and the SoloMD equivalent:

When to pick SoloMD

• You write on iPad / iOS / Android — Tolaria is desktop-only.
• You write in Chinese / Japanese / Korean — SoloMD auto-detects GBK / Big5 / Shift-JIS encodings; Tolaria assumes UTF-8.
• You want the agent-workflow layer — scheduled recipes (cron / on-save / on-commit), an AutoGit branch sandbox that lets you accept/reject agent writes, and replayable traces. Tolaria has built-in AI providers, but agent writes commit directly with no sandbox/replay.
• You need Pandoc export (EPUB / ODT / LaTeX) or academic citations (@citekey + .bib / CSL) — Tolaria ships neither (it added PDF export in mid-2026).
• You want local semantic search (on-device RAG) — Tolaria has none.
• You import from .docx / .pdf / .xlsx / .pptx — Tolaria has no file converter.
• You want multi-tab + split panes, presentation mode (⌘⌥P), or Vim mode — Tolaria has none of these.
• You want 14 AI providers in one keychain-backed panel (incl. DeepSeek · Qwen · GLM · Kimi · 火山方舟) — Tolaria's built-in list is shorter.

When to pick Tolaria

As of SoloMD 4.6 the list is short. The features that used to be Tolaria-only — type-driven sidebar, typed relationships, the relationship graph, the properties inspector, saved views, the Inbox workflow, and tldraw whiteboards — now ship in both. What's genuinely left:

• You want to write inside a Notion-style block editor (BlockNote, slash commands). SoloMD stays CodeMirror source + four view modes (including a WYSIWYG live-edit view), so if a true block editor is the surface you compose in, Tolaria is still the one.
• You want Tolaria's 6 in-app CLI coding agents (Claude Code · Codex · OpenCode · Pi · Gemini · Kiro) docked in the app, rather than SoloMD's solomd agent handoff.

The gap is essentially closed. MCP server, AutoGit history, multi-vault, Windows, a docked AI chat panel, built-in AI providers — and now the whole knowledge-graph layer (properties, types, typed relationships, the Neighborhood graph, saved views, Inbox, whiteboards) — ship in both. With 4.6, SoloMD matches Tolaria's structural half while keeping its own large edges: iPad / iOS / Android, CJK encodings (GBK / Big5 / Shift-JIS), Pandoc / citation export, file import, on-device RAG, multi-tab + split panes, Vim, presentation mode, 14 AI providers, scheduled agent recipes + AutoGit accept/reject sandbox + replayable trace, E2EE sync, public share links, and a CLI. Tolaria's remaining edge is the BlockNote block editor (and its in-app CLI agents).

Both editors share

• Tauri 2 architecture (smaller / faster than Electron alternatives like Obsidian).
• Open source, free forever, no accounts; plain .md + YAML, local-first.
• Windows · macOS · Linux desktop builds.
• Built-in AI providers (BYOK) + a bundled MCP server.
• Every vault is a git repo with built-in version history.
• Wikilinks [[note]] + backlinks panel.
• Active maintenance — both shipped releases through mid-2026.

Migration — Tolaria to SoloMD

Both write plain .md with YAML front-matter, so opening your Tolaria vault folder in SoloMD just works. Caveats:

• Tolaria's type metadata (e.g. type: Project) lives in front-matter — SoloMD 4.6 reads it the same way and turns each type into a first-class sidebar section, with its own icon / color / order / pinned props.
• Your typed relationships (belongs_to / related_to / has) carry over unchanged — SoloMD 4.6 resolves them and their automatic inverses, and surfaces them in the Neighborhood graph.
• If you used Tolaria's AutoGit, your vault is already a git repo — SoloMD's AutoGit (v2.2+) is compatible with the same convention. Both use libgit2 and a local-only .git inside the workspace.
• The Inbox flag carries over too — SoloMD 4.6 ships the same Inbox workflow (⌘E mark-organized + auto-advance + inbox-zero). tldraw whiteboards open directly: SoloMD reads the same .md board format.

FAQ

Is SoloMD's MCP server real?

Yes — shipped in v2.2. A 1.5 MB Tauri sidecar binary (solomd-mcp) speaks MCP over stdio (no network port). Out of the box it exposes 8 read tools — list_notes, read_note, search, get_backlinks, list_tags, get_outline, etc. — plus write_note and append_to_note gated behind --allow-write. Path-traversal guarded, workspace-canonical containment. Discoverable by any MCP client — Claude Desktop, Cursor, Codex CLI, your own agent.

Does Tolaria run on Windows / mobile?

Windows — yes, as of April 2026 (x64). Mobile — no: Tolaria is desktop-only (macOS · Windows · Linux). SoloMD additionally ships on iPad / iOS (App Store) and Android, so it's the pick if you read or edit on a tablet or phone.

Can I use both?

Yes — they read the same .md files and both treat the vault as a git repo. A common combo is Tolaria on a desktop + SoloMD on an iPad / phone on the road, all pointing at the same git-synced vault.