Feature Guide

Status editing & selection

Open the picker from the status bar badge, editor toolbar button, file explorer context menu, or the Change current note status command. The same modal handles single files, multi-select batches, and folder runs.
Browse by template tabs (All, per template, Custom), search, and use full keyboard navigation (arrows/Tab + Enter/Backspace/Escape). Current statuses appear as removable chips; single-status mode keeps only one value.
Works on Markdown and non-Markdown; resolves every relevant frontmatter key (default tag and any mappings) before writing.
Clipboard helpers: Copy current note status and Paste status to current note mirror what you see in the picker.

Right-click one or many files → Change note status to batch-apply statuses.
Right-click a folder → Apply note status to folder; enable recursion in settings if you want nested folders included.
The modal shows how many files will change before you confirm.

Status bar

Clickable badges; hide entirely or auto-hide when empty. Keep a “No status” badge with custom text/icon/color if you prefer.
Template names can be hidden, auto-shown only on conflicts, or always shown.
Badge visuals: accent stripe, solid fill, or dot; content can be icon+text, icon only, text only, or empty accent.

Editor toolbar

Optional badge in the editor header. Place it left, right-before actions, or right, and choose whether it shows for all editors or only the active one.
Uses the same unknown-status icon/color you configure elsewhere.

File explorer

Status icons appear next to file names. Choose placement (filename left, filename right, absolute right), add a frame or keep it frameless, and pick whether icons use status colors or the theme.
Extra cues per option: color filename, tint the row, add a left border, append a dot, underline the filename. Unknowns can be hidden.
Hover an icon to open the Status Overview popup listing every frontmatter key with statuses, highlighting the default tag.

Status overview popup

Lightweight popup used by explorer/status icons; lists statuses per key and labels the default tag. Respects the enable/disable toggle.

Status Dashboard

Ribbon icon/command (gated by Experimental Features + Dashboard toggles and the vault size limit). Shows the active note (path, modified time, statuses per tag), vault totals, and a status distribution chart. Clicking a bar runs a search for that status.
Quick Actions panel: open grouped view, find unassigned notes, change/cycle/clear status, copy/paste status, search by status, toggle multi-status mode, and run Quick Status Commands.

Grouped Status View

Ribbon icon/command (same gating and vault limit). Groups notes by frontmatter key, then by status (template badges shown when relevant).
Filters: quick search, filter by note name substring, and filter by template id. Groups are collapsible and support “load more” for large sets. Clicking a note opens it in a new leaf.

Built-in templates: Colorful (idea → draft → inProgress → editing → pending → onHold → needsUpdate → completed → archived), Minimal (todo → inProgress → review → done), Academic (research → outline → draft → review → revision → final → published), Project (planning → backlog → ready → inDevelopment → testing → review → approved → live).
Build your own templates (name, description, ordered statuses with emoji/Lucide + color). New templates auto-enable; you can edit/delete or reset built-ins anytime.
Custom statuses live outside templates; create, reorder, delete them, or run in “Custom only” mode to hide template statuses entirely.
Unknown status handling is configurable (icon/Lucide icon, color, and whether unknowns show in explorer/status bar).

Change current note status (opens picker).
Cycle through statuses (single-status mode only).
Clear status.
Copy/Paste status (clipboard).
Toggle multiple statuses mode.
Search notes by current status (opens Global Search with queries for every configured frontmatter key).
Open grouped status view (requires toggle).
Quick Status Commands: select statuses in settings to auto-register Set status to ... commands you can bind to hotkeys.

Frontmatter key prefix defaults to obsidian-note-status; change it per vault. Map templates/statuses to extra YAML keys, and optionally also write mapped tags to the default key.
Single-status mode can store the value as a list (status: [in-progress]) or plain string (status: in-progress) for compatibility with plugins that expect strings.
Non-Markdown files store statuses in .obsidian/plugins/obsidian-note-status/non-markdown-statuses.json. Rename/delete events stay in sync automatically.
Strict status validation removes unknown statuses when you edit a file’s statuses—use with caution if you expect ad-hoc values.