obsidian-cli

Obsidian CLI — Agent Reference

When to Use CLI vs File Tools

Use CLI when you need Obsidian's index or app features: search, backlinks, links, tags, tasks, properties, bases, templates, outline, orphans, unresolved links

Use file tools (Read/Write/Edit/Grep/Glob) for: simple file read/write, bulk text replacement, grep across files — no app dependency

Rule of thumb: if Obsidian's index adds value, use CLI. If it's plain text manipulation, use file tools.

Syntax Basics

obsidian <command> [param=value ...] [flag ...]

• Vault targeting: vault="My Vault" as first param, or run from inside vault dir
• File targeting: path=exact/path.md (vault-relative) vs file=name (link-style resolution)
• Params: key=value — quote values with spaces: name="My Note"
• Flags: boolean switches, no = — e.g. silent, overwrite, counts, total
• Multiline: \n for newline, \t for tab in content strings
• Structured output: format=json (search, base:query), format=tsv (properties, tags)
• Clipboard: append --copy to copy output

Key Commands

Read & Write

obsidian read path=<path>                                    # read file content
obsidian append path=<path> content="<text>"                 # append to file
obsidian prepend path=<path> content="<text>"                # prepend after frontmatter
obsidian create name=<name> content="<text>" silent          # create file (safe — won't overwrite)
obsidian create name=<name> template=<template> overwrite silent  # create from template
obsidian move path=<from> to=<to>                            # move/rename file
obsidian delete path=<path>                                  # move to system trash (safe)

Gotchas:

• create without silent opens the file in Obsidian's UI — always add silent during agent operations.
• create doesn't auto-create directories — use mkdir -p via Bash first if the parent folder doesn't exist.
• create with template= may place the file in the template's configured folder, ignoring path=. Verify the actual path with search or files after creation.