Open QuickAdd from a URI

A special link, obsidian://quickadd, runs a QuickAdd choice from outside Obsidian - from an Apple Shortcut, a launcher, another app, or a Markdown link in a note. You give it the name of the choice to run and, optionally, the values to fill in, and QuickAdd runs it just as if you had triggered it yourself.

This is the shape of the link:

obsidian://quickadd?choice=<YOUR_CHOICE_NAME>[&value-VALUE_NAME=...]

Encode everything

Every parameter name and value has to be URL encoded to work. An online tool like urlencoder.org makes it easy to encode parts of the link.

The only required part is choice, which picks the choice to run by its name. The name has to match exactly, or QuickAdd cannot find it.

If you would rather script this from a shell than build links, see QuickAdd CLI for the native Obsidian CLI commands.

Pass values into the choice

Add a value-<name> parameter for each named value the choice asks for. A capture asking for {{VALUE:contents}} is filled by value-contents=....

If a variable name has a space in it, encode the space as %20 like everything else. A variable named log notes is passed as value-log%20notes=....

Values are used exactly as they are encoded in the link. If a format should ignore an accidental leading or trailing space for one placeholder, add |trim to it, for example {{VALUE:log notes|trim}}.

Unnamed values - a bare {{VALUE}}/{{NAME}}, or {{MVALUE}} - cannot be filled from the link. QuickAdd prompts for them inside Obsidian as usual.

Choose which vault: vault=

Like every Obsidian URI, you can add a vault parameter to say which vault to run QuickAdd in. Leave it out and Obsidian uses your most recent vault.

obsidian://quickadd?vault=My%20Vault&choice=Daily%20log&value-contents=Lorem%20ipsum.

Get a result back: x-callback-url

QuickAdd can open a callback link once a choice finishes, so whatever triggered it (an Apple Shortcut, say) can react to the result and receive the path of the affected note. This follows the x-callback-url convention.

Off by default

This is opt-in. Turn on Settings → AI & Online → Allow URI x-callback-url first. It is off by default because the callback link is controlled by whoever creates the obsidian:// link, and the callback can carry your note’s vault path.

Template and Capture only

Callbacks work for Template and Capture choices. Triggering a Macro or Multi choice with a callback fires x-error with errorCode=unsupported-choice-type instead. (You can still trigger Macro and Multi choices from the URI without a callback.)

Which callback fires when

Parameter	Fired when
x-success	the choice completed successfully
x-error	the choice failed, was aborted, was not found, or is unsupported
x-cancel	you cancelled a prompt while the choice was running
x-callback-url	legacy shorthand - used only when none of the above are present; it then fires for success and cancel (never error)

If you do not provide a slot, nothing opens for that outcome (there is no fallback - a cancel with no x-cancel opens nothing).

Only shortcuts: and obsidian: callback links are allowed. Any other scheme (such as https:, file:, or javascript:) is rejected and the choice does not run.

What QuickAdd sends back

QuickAdd appends these query parameters to your callback link:

• On x-success: status=success, and - for Template/Capture - path=<vault-relative path> and url=<obsidian://open…> pointing at the affected note.
• On x-error: status=error and a stable errorCode (one of choice-not-found, unsupported-choice-type, execution-failed, execution-aborted, bad-callback-url). The detailed error message stays in Obsidian’s log and is never sent to the callback.
• On x-cancel: status=cancel.

Encode your callback link twice

Your callback link is itself a value inside the obsidian:// link, so it must be fully percent-encoded (double-encoded). If you leave a = or & un-encoded, Obsidian’s URI parser silently cuts the callback off before QuickAdd ever sees it.

For example, this looks reasonable but is broken - the =My%20Cool%20Shortcut part is dropped, leaving shortcuts://run-shortcut?name:

obsidian://quickadd?choice=Daily%20log&x-success=shortcuts://run-shortcut?name=My%20Cool%20Shortcut

The correct form encodes the entire x-success value:

obsidian://quickadd?choice=Daily%20log&x-success=shortcuts%3A%2F%2Frun-shortcut%3Fname%3DMy%2520Cool%2520Shortcut

(Note the %2520 - the spaces inside the shortcut name are encoded twice because the value is decoded once by Obsidian and once by Shortcuts.)

Full example

Trigger a capture, run a shortcut on success, and pass along the created note’s path:

obsidian://quickadd?vault=My%20Vault&choice=Daily%20log&value-contents=Lorem%20ipsum&x-success=shortcuts%3A%2F%2Frun-shortcut%3Fname%3DLog%2520Saved

On success QuickAdd opens your x-success link with these extra query parameters appended (shown here decoded - they are percent-encoded on the wire):

• status = success
• path = Daily/2026-06-14.md
• url = obsidian://open?vault=My Vault&file=Daily/2026-06-14.md

Your shortcut reads them from the link it was opened with.

Mobile

QuickAdd opens callbacks with window.open, exactly like Obsidian’s own x-callback support. Whether a custom scheme such as shortcuts: launches reliably on iOS is a platform behaviour shared with Obsidian core - verify on your device.

Introduced in QuickAdd 2.14.0.

Watch out for sync services

Caution

When you use QuickAdd via URI with a sync service (Obsidian Sync, iCloud, Dropbox, and so on), there is a limitation to be aware of.

If Obsidian hasn’t been opened on a device, files created on other devices haven’t synced to it yet. QuickAdd can then create a duplicate file that overwrites the synced version when it finally arrives.

How this goes wrong

1. You create a Daily Note on your laptop.
2. Without opening Obsidian on your phone, you trigger a Capture via URI.
3. QuickAdd checks whether the Daily Note exists (it doesn’t, locally).
4. QuickAdd creates a new Daily Note.
5. When sync runs, the new file overwrites the one from your laptop.

How to avoid it

• Open Obsidian first: always open Obsidian and wait for sync before using URIs.
• Use device-specific names: configure different filename formats per device (for example {{date}}-mobile).
• Capture to active file: use an already-open note to avoid creating a file at all.
• Include timestamps: add {{time}} to filenames so each one is unique.

This is a fundamental limitation of file-based sync services and cannot be fully resolved without sync-status APIs.