Obsidian CLI

Run obsidian <command> to control a running Obsidian instance from the terminal. The app must be running for most commands; the first command will launch Obsidian if not open.

Run obsidian help or obsidian help <command> for the canonical, always-up-to-date command reference. This skill documents common patterns and non-obvious behaviors.

Status and commands

!which obsidian

Targeting vaults and files

• Vault: vault=<name> as first parameter. Default: cwd if it's a vault folder, else the active vault.
• File: file=<name> resolves like a wikilink (name only, no path or extension needed). path=<path> for exact path from vault root.
• TUI: Run obsidian with no args for interactive mode; omit the obsidian prefix inside.

Parameters and flags