obsidian-cli

Overview

The obsidian CLI is an official command-line interface that requires Obsidian to be running. It allows reading, writing, searching, and inspecting vault notes from a shell.

When to Use

Running obsidian shell commands against a vault in the live Obsidian app: reading, creating, appending to, searching and inspecting notes, and setting properties, from the terminal or a script.

When NOT to use

• Obsidian is not running — the CLI requires the live Obsidian app to be open.
• Obsidian is closed and a script needs the notes — read the Markdown files directly instead.
• OFM syntax questions with no shell interaction — use obsidian-markdown.

Core Process

1. Verify Obsidian is running before issuing CLI commands.
2. Use file=<name> for wikilink-style resolution, or path=<vault-relative-path> for exact path resolution.
3. For multi-vault setups, add vault=<name> to target a specific vault.

Techniques

Parameter conventions

• Parameters use = syntax: file=NoteName, not --file NoteName.
• Flags are boolean with no value: --copy, --silent, --total.
• Multiline content uses \n and \t escape sequences.

File resolution

Form	Meaning
file=<name>	Resolves like a wikilink (search across vault)
path=<path>	Exact vault-root-relative path
vault=<name>	Target a specific vault (multi-vault setups)

Read operations

• obsidian read file=<name> — print note content.
• obsidian daily:read — read today's daily note.
• obsidian search <query> — full-text search.
• obsidian tags — list all tags.
• obsidian backlinks file=<name> — list notes linking to this note.

Write operations

• obsidian create file=<name> content=<text> — create a note.
• obsidian append file=<name> content=<text> — append to a note.
• obsidian daily:append content=<text> — append to today's daily note.
• obsidian property:set file=<name> key=<k> value=<v> — set a frontmatter property.

Developer / inspection

• obsidian plugin:reload name=<plugin> — reload a plugin.
• obsidian dev:errors — show console errors.
• obsidian dev:screenshot — take a screenshot.
• obsidian dev:dom — inspect the DOM.
• obsidian dev:console — open the console.
• obsidian eval code=<js> — evaluate JavaScript in the Obsidian context.
• obsidian dev:css — show applied CSS.

Red Flags

• Using --file syntax instead of file= — parameters use =, not --.
• Running CLI commands when Obsidian is not open — the command will hang or error.
• Using path= when file= would work — path= requires an exact vault-root-relative path and is brittle across vault reorganizations.

Verification

Run obsidian tags and confirm output. Obsidian must be running.