5 Obsidian Features Most Beginners Miss [2025 Guide]

Obsidian stands out as one of the most popular note-taking apps for knowledge workers and students. It’s built around plain text Markdown files, giving users total control of their notes and privacy. Obsidian’s ability to connect notes with backlinks and visualize your ideas in a flexible graph view has made it a top choice for personal knowledge management.

While many people know about its core features like linking, folders, and graph view, Obsidian goes much further. Tucked away are lesser-known tricks and options that can help beginners unlock more from the app right from the start. Whether you’re taking class notes or managing projects, these powerful features can make a big difference in how organized and productive you feel.

Properties: Dynamic Metadata for Better Organization

Imagine flipping through a messy pile of papers on your desk, searching for that one note you just know has the answer. In Obsidian, Properties solve this digital clutter. They add context, structure, and search power to your notes by letting you use metadata—small pieces of information stored at the top of any note. This feature quietly streamlines organization and makes it easy to find, group, and sort your ideas anytime.

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What are Properties in Obsidian?

Properties in Obsidian, sometimes called “note properties” or formerly “YAML front matter,” are structured fields you add to notes right at the top. Instead of just writing random tags or side-comments, you give your note special “labels” such as tags, dates, authors, statuses, or really any custom field you want. These bits of data unlock smarter search and easy organization because Obsidian knows where to look for them.

Some common ways beginners use properties:

• Tags: Group notes by project, topic, or task.
• Status: Track if something’s “In Progress,” “Done,” or “To Review.”
• Dates: Add due dates, created dates, or review dates for better scheduling.
• Custom fields: Create your own like “priority,” “related project,” or “inspiration source.”

Properties don’t clutter your main note area—they sit quietly at the top but are always available when you need them. This makes them perfect for sorting through dozens (or hundreds) of notes as your vault grows.

Learn more about how Properties work in Obsidian’s official help.

How Properties Help with Organization

Once you add properties to your notes, Obsidian makes it easy to filter, group, and search using this data. Instead of searching by keyword and hoping for the best, you can pull up every note with a property like status: in-progress or quickly list pages tagged as your next assignment.

You can use Properties to:

• Build dashboards: Pull together everything due this week or notes related to a single class.
• Track projects: Assign custom “phase” or “owner” fields to each note.
• Sort and filter: Use Properties for advanced queries, making even big vaults easy to wrangle.
• Link ideas: Connect notes by project, theme, or task—without manual hunting.

Many Obsidian users share best practices for using Properties, including setting up a standard template for new notes.

Getting Started with Properties

You don’t have to be an expert to start using Properties. Here’s how to use them as a beginner:

1. Create a new note.
2. Click “Add property” at the top of the note (in newer versions) or add three dashes (—) at the very top for older vaults.
3. Add fields like tag, status, or date.
4. Pick values for each field that help you organize, such as tag: lecture, status: draft, or review_date: 2025-06-15.

Want ideas on organizing your notes with properties or learn from real examples? Check out this introductory guide to Obsidian Properties.

Properties may seem small, but this smart metadata turns Obsidian into a powerful digital filing cabinet—no more digging, just tap and find what you need.

Embedded Searches: Live, Dynamic Content Blocks

Have you ever wished your notes could gather related information automatically—like magic? Obsidian lets you build live, self-updating content blocks right inside your notes using embedded searches. With this trick, your notes become dynamic dashboards, always bringing fresh, relevant data right where you need it.

How to Create an Embedded Search

It’s easy to add embedded search queries to any Obsidian note. This feature lets you pull in live search results so you always see the latest matching notes—no manual hunting required. Here’s how you can set one up:

1. Open the note where you want the embedded search to appear.
2. Type a code block fence using three backticks (```), then add the word query after the first set of backticks, like this: ```query your search terms
3. Inside the code block, write your search syntax. For example, if you want a list of notes tagged as “meeting”, type: tag:#meeting
4. Save your note. The results will instantly show up below the code block—no extra steps needed.

Embedded searches use the same syntax as the search bar in Obsidian. You can search for tags, keywords, properties, or even use more advanced filters to get exactly what you want. Every time you open the note, Obsidian refreshes the search block, so your information is always up to date.

For a helpful step-by-step guide with screenshots, see this walkthrough on how to embed search queries in Obsidian notes.

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Real-World Use Cases for Embedded Searches

Embedded searches aren’t just a neat trick—they’re a huge time-saver once you start using them. Let’s look at a few ways you can use these dynamic content blocks:

• Build Project Dashboards: Show all notes tagged with your project name or all tasks marked as “in progress.” Your dashboard quietly updates itself whenever you add or edit notes.
• Create Meeting Summaries: Gather all meeting notes from this month or everything tagged #meeting in one place. No more scrolling or manual collection.
• Track To-Dos: Show every unchecked to-do from across your vault. As you check items off, the embedded list shrinks.
• Link Research Notes: If you’re working on a research paper, list every note that mentions a key topic or source.
• Summarize Linked Notes: Display all notes linking to a hub page, turning it into a dynamic table of contents.

You aren’t limited to simple searches—mix and match filters to get lists by tag, property, folder, or even note content. Curious about more creative setups? This guide on using embedded queries to simplify workflows has detailed examples and inspiration from real users.

Embedded searches unlock Obsidian’s full potential, making your workspace work for you—always organized, always fresh.