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Basic Memory vs Cognee

A side-by-side comparison of Basic Memory and Cognee, two Memory tools, drawn from Ignaite's continuously-verified listings.

Compared from listings verified as of

Basic Memory

Memory

Persistent, local knowledge graph for AI tools — stored as plain Markdown.

View Basic Memory

Cognee

Memory

Open-source memory for AI agents.

View Cognee

At a glance

Feature comparison of Basic Memory and Cognee
AttributeBasic MemoryCognee
CategoryMemoryMemory
PricingFREEMIUMFREEMIUM
LicenseOpen coreOpen core
DeploymentHybridHybrid
Platforms (differs)CLI, macOS, Windows, LinuxAPI
Model support (differs)Model-agnosticBYO key / model
Vendor (differs)Basic MachinesCognee

The honest brief

Basic Memory

Unlike cloud memory stores, your graph stays in editable local Markdown you can open in Obsidian — portable and inspectable, not locked in a DB.

  • Plain-Markdown, local-first storage
  • Obsidian-compatible knowledge graph
  • Works across Claude, Cursor, VS Code via MCP
  • Open-source, no vendor lock-in
  • AGPL-3.0 may not suit every team
  • Cross-device sync is a paid cloud add-on
  • Setup needs a local CLI install

Cognee

Builds an LLM-derived knowledge graph alongside embeddings, so recall follows relationships, not just vector similarity.

  • Self-hostable Python SDK
  • Recall follows concept relationships
  • Bring your own LLM/embedding provider
  • Newer, smaller ecosystem
  • Cognify pipeline adds LLM cost
  • Self-host setup overhead
Basic Memory detailsCognee detailsAll Memory apps