Inline Properties

An Obsidian plugin that lets you reference note properties as inline variables anywhere in your vault using {{variable}} syntax. Values render inline in both Live Preview and Reading mode.

How it works

Add variables to a note's frontmatter (Properties):

---
project: Acme Corp
rate: 150
---

Then use them anywhere in that note, or anywhere else in the vault:

The project **{{project}}** runs at ${{rate}}/hour.

The {{variable}} token is replaced inline as you type. Click or tap a rendered value to edit its source property directly. The editor shows the property name and owning note, and includes an Edit reference action when the raw {{...}} source is editable. When you copy text containing variables, the resolved values are copied, not the raw syntax.

Strings, numbers, booleans, lists, and objects keep their existing type when edited. Lists and objects are edited as validated JSON. Changes are written to the owning note's frontmatter and refreshed anywhere the variable is rendered, including imported blocks.

Variable scope

Syntax	Resolves to
{{name}}	Property name from the current note's frontmatter
{{Notes/Budget.md.rate}}	Property rate from Notes/Budget.md
{{Clients/Acme.md.contact.email}}	Nested frontmatter property in another note

Local (current note) properties take priority over vault-wide references when names collide.

Autocomplete

Type {{ in any note to trigger autocomplete. Matching is fuzzy and name-first: type a fragment of a variable name (you don't need the path) to find it anywhere in the vault. Each suggestion shows the variable name prominently with its originating path as a muted reference on the side, plus a value preview. Selecting a suggestion inserts the full {{path}} reference and handles Obsidian's auto-closing brackets automatically.

Settings

Setting	Default	Description
Highlight live text	Off	Adds a visual highlight to rendered variable values
Copy resolved values	On	In editor and rendered-note selections or code blocks, replaces {{var}} with its current value instead of the raw syntax

Custom highlighting

Override the .lv-live-text CSS class in a CSS snippet:

.lv-live-text {
    background-color: transparent;
    border-bottom: 2px solid var(--color-accent);
    border-radius: 0;
    padding: 0;
}

Installation

This plugin is in the Obsidian community plugin list. You can install it directly from Obsidian.

Development

npm install
npm run dev      # watch mode
npm run build    # production build

Targets Obsidian 0.15.0+, compatible with desktop and mobile.

Massive-vault benchmark

The synthetic benchmark exercises the production VaultProperties index with large in-memory metadata caches. It measures initial indexing, active-note and metadata updates, autocomplete candidate preparation, lookups, and heap growth:

npm run bench:massive-vault
npm run bench:massive-vault -- --notes=10000,50000 --properties=8 --folders=100

This isolates plugin indexing costs. It does not measure Obsidian's Markdown parsing, disk I/O, or editor/Reading View DOM rendering.

See Performance for the index design, benchmark limits, and measured before/after results at up to 100,000 notes.

Philosophy

This plugin does one thing: inline variable substitution. The codebase is intentionally minimal to stay easy to maintain. There are no plans to add new features. Future work is limited to improving what is already here.

Credits

Forked from HamzaBenyazid/Live-variables. Refactored to a CodeMirror 6 ViewPlugin for Live Preview and a native EditorSuggest for autocomplete.