AutoDater

AutoDater for Obsidian

Automatically add Created and Updated dates to new and edited Markdown notes. Zero setup, no manual date tracking.

Requires Obsidian 1.13.0 or later.

What it does

AutoDater writes dates into YAML frontmatter when you create or edit a note:

---
Created: 2026-08-01
Updated: 2026-08-01
---

• Adds Created when a new note has no existing value for that property
• Updates Updated when you edit a note
• Preserves existing Created values
• Processes Markdown notes only
• Stores dates inside the note, so they travel with the file when frontmatter is preserved
• Waits six seconds after editing before updating frontmatter
• Works without templates or configuration
• Can exclude folders (for example, a Templates folder) so AutoDater leaves them untouched

Install

1. Open Settings → Community Plugins.
2. Click Browse and search for AutoDater.
3. Install and enable it.

Settings

Defaults:

• Created property: Created
• Updated property: Updated
• Date format: YYYY-MM-DD
• Excluded folders: none

You can customize property names and date format in Settings → AutoDater. On Obsidian 1.13.0 and later, these settings also appear in the global settings search.

Excluded folders:

• Add folders you want AutoDater to skip, such as a Templates folder.
• AutoDater will not add or update dates in any note inside an excluded folder, including its subfolders.
• Use Add folder to enter a folder path, then remove entries with the delete button.

Date formats:

• YYYY-MM-DD — date only (default)
• DD-MM-YYYY — date only
• MM-DD-YYYY — date only
• Local date and time — YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM
• ISO 8601 — full ISO date-time string

Property names:

• Changing a property name affects future writes only. Existing frontmatter properties are not renamed automatically.
• Names are matched case-insensitively when updating existing fields. For example, Updated and updated are treated as the same property; modified is a separate property.

Obsidian property types:

• If you use DD-MM-YYYY or MM-DD-YYYY, set the property type to Text in Obsidian. The Date property type expects YYYY-MM-DD and may misread other formats (for example, 02-08-2026 as 2002-08-20).

Important behavior

• Existing notes are not backfilled when you enable AutoDater.
• Editing an existing note adds or updates Updated, but does not add a missing Created value.
• Created records the date AutoDater first sees a new note without an existing Created property.

Development

npm install
npm run build

See GitHub Releases for version history.