Getting Started

QuickAdd turns your repetitive Obsidian actions - creating a note from a template, logging a line to your journal, running a script - into single commands you trigger with a hotkey. Set a workflow up once, then run it in a keystroke from anywhere in your vault.

New here? Let QuickAdd set up your first choices, or build your first workflow below in about a minute.

Install QuickAdd

Install QuickAdd from Obsidian’s Community plugins browser, then enable it.

If you cannot use the plugin browser, follow the manual installation guide.

Choose the right choice type

If you want to…	Use this	Start here
Create a new note from a reusable file	Template choice	Template Choices
Append text to a journal, log, task list, or existing file	Capture choice	Capture Choices
Run one or more Obsidian commands, scripts, or choices	Macro choice	Macro Choices
Group choices into a nested menu	Multi choice	Multi Choices
Share configured workflows across vaults	Package	Share QuickAdd Packages

Most workflows start with either a Template choice or a Capture choice. Add a Macro choice when you need scripting, multiple steps, or data from another plugin or API.

You don’t pick the type directly. New choice in the settings list offers presets named after what you want to happen, such as Log with a timestamp or Run a script. Each one creates a choice of the right type, already set up.

Your first choices

An empty list in Settings → QuickAdd asks What do you do in Obsidian? Click every answer that fits, such as Keep a daily journal or Meeting and people notes, then click Create choices. QuickAdd adds ready-to-run choices for each answer, set up for your vault: with daily notes on, the journal and task choices write to today’s daily note, and without them to a dated note in Journal/. Each card says what it adds before you pick it, and the presets page lists them all.

Run one from the command palette (Ctrl/Cmd+P) with QuickAdd: Run, or put it on a button in a note to run it with a click or a tap. To build a choice yourself instead, click New choice under the question, or follow the first workflow below.

First workflow

Let’s build a capture that adds a timestamped line to your daily journal. It takes about a minute.

1. Open Settings → QuickAdd, click New choice, and pick Add to a note. It creates a Capture choice and opens its settings right away, as a page of the settings window.
2. Set Name to Add to journal. (Before QuickAdd 2.30.0, the settings open in a dialog; click the name at the top to rename it.)
3. Set Where to Journal/{{DATE}}.md - the note today’s entries land in.
4. Click More settings and turn on Create note if it doesn’t exist, so the first capture of the day creates today’s note instead of stopping with a notice that the note does not exist.
5. In What, enter - {{DATE:HH:mm}} {{VALUE}} - the shape of one entry. (Before QuickAdd 2.30.0, turn on the Capture format toggle first.)
6. Close the settings. Open the command palette (Ctrl/Cmd+P), run QuickAdd: Run, pick Add to journal, and type your entry.

QuickAdd writes a line like - 09:42 Standup moved to Wednesday at the bottom of today’s journal note, without opening it.

Under the choice’s name, the settings list and the launcher now show what it does: Adds a line at the bottom of Journal/{date}.

Once it works the way you want, click the ⚡ icon next to the choice to add it to the command palette, then give it a hotkey in Obsidian’s Settings → Hotkeys.

The {{DATE}} and {{VALUE}} above are format syntax: placeholders QuickAdd fills in each time you run the choice. There are placeholders for dates, your answers, links, clipboard content, and more. When a prompt asks you for text, the suggester system lets you type [[ or # to pull in a file, tag, or heading from your vault.

Common paths

I want examples first

Use the examples overview to pick a complete workflow by choice type, difficulty, prerequisites, and outcome.

Good first examples:

• Capture: Add entries to your daily note
• Template: Add an inbox item
• Macro: Book Finder
• Capture: Canvas capture

I want to automate with scripts

Start with the scripting overview, then move to User Scripts and the QuickAdd API reference when you need exact method details.

I want to call QuickAdd from outside Obsidian

Use Obsidian URI for URI-triggered workflows, or the QuickAdd CLI for shell scripts and external automation.