Roam

Roam (developed by Roam Research) is a cloud-based Note-taking and personal knowledge management application. Built around an associative, non-hierarchical data model, Roam connects individual notes and text blocks through bidirectional linking, allowing users to organize research, daily thoughts, and documentation into interconnected knowledge graphs.

Outlining & Block-Level References

Roam structures document pages as hierarchical outlines composed of individual bulleted text blocks. Each block operates as a distinct data unit that can be referenced, embedded, or transcluded across multiple pages within a graph workspace, allowing content updates in a primary block to reflect across all linked instances.

Bidirectional Linking & Graph Navigation

The platform utilizes bidirectional links (created via double-bracket syntax or tags) to automatically generate back-references between related pages and blocks. An interactive visual graph view maps connections across the workspace, enabling users to trace relationships between concepts and navigate accumulated research associatively.

Collaboration, Multi-Device Support, & Ecosystem

Roam supports multi-user collaboration on both private and public knowledge graphs. The platform is accessible via web browsers, native desktop applications (macOS for Apple Silicon and Intel, Windows, and Linux), and mobile applications (iOS and Android). Roam provides API access for custom integrations alongside a Chrome browser extension (Roam Reader) for capturing web references directly into a graph workspace.