Steps to reproduce
On a Linux distro running GNOME, install or configure a keyboard that outputs characters with codepoints at or above U+10000. I ran into this when testing a Shavian alphabet keyboard, whose characters start at U+10450.
Open a file in Obsidian, and type with the above keyboard selected.
Did you follow the troubleshooting guide? [Y/N]
Yes. I tested in the sandbox vault. I don’t have any community plugins installed. I searched for similar issues on the forum but didn’t find anything; at first, because indeed, no issues sounded similar to mine; later, because searching gave me an alert that the server was overloaded and search had been disabled.
Expected result
When I press the key sequence “asdf”, an application should receive the characters “𐑩𐑕𐑛𐑓”. I have confirmed that the GNOME text editor, Firefox, and Discord all exhibit the expected behavior.
Actual result
The string “ѩѕћѓ” appears in Obsidian’s editor window. Note that each character’s codepoint is equal to the expected codepoint modulo 0x10000 (e.g. 𐑩 is U+10469, while ѩ is U+0469).
Environment
SYSTEM INFO:
Obsidian version: v1.11.5
Installer version: v1.11.5
Operating system: #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Sun, 18 Jan 2026 00:34:07 +0000 6.18.6-arch1-1
Login status: not logged in
Language: en
Insider build toggle: off
Live preview: on
Base theme: adapt to system
Community theme: none
Snippets enabled: 0
Restricted mode: on
RECOMMENDATIONS:
none
Additional information
Before GNOME dropped Xorg support, I was able to use a program called Keyman to access a Shavian keyboard, and that was able to input Shavian text just fine.
Further, I can copy and paste Shavian characters, it’s only when entering them from a keyboard that an issue occurs. I tested with Discord to see if it’s an issue with Electron, and the fact that it works there suggests the issue is unique to Obsidian.
The only other ticket I’ve found mentioning Shavian concerns word counting, which is not the issue I’m experiencing. I’m unable to link to the ticket.
I did a little more testing. Originally, I was using the version installed by pacman. I tried the AppImage from the website, and saw the same behavior. The version in flatpak, however, behaves correctly. This may seem to indicate an issue with my system’s Electron, though I’m still not 100% satisfied with that answer since Discord behaved correctly from the beginning, and that’s installed with pacman as well.
I checked with the version of Obsidian installed on my laptop (running Ubuntu with GNOME on Wayland) and Obsidian was installed with apt on that system. Copying the keyboard layout files to that system, Obsidian exhibits the expected behavior on that system as well.
On the Arch install, the system Electron appears to be Electron 39 (electron39 39.5.1-1), if that’s any help.
We don’t provide support for third party packages or community made packages.
The installer of Obsidian 1.11.4+ that we make uses electron 39+ which defaults to using Wayland/Native (as opposed to Xwayland).
There are some known issues with input methods, wayland native, and linux desktop environments that are outside our control and will hopefully eventually get addressed. See here.
You can force obsidian to run in xwayland mode by adding the following command line switch --ozone-platform=x11.
I did mention that this occurs with the AppImage available on the obsidian.md front page, using the default settings. Forcing X11 mode does cause the Obsidian AppImage to exhibit the expected behavior, so perhaps this is an issue with the Wayland backend at some point.
I don’t have Fcitx5 installed, and I do have IBus, so I’m assuming I fall under the “IBus with GNOME” group at the link you gave, which is listed as “should now work with recent versions of GNOME.” I’m running GNOME 49, so that would seem to mean I’m up to date. That’s the only mention I see of known input issues.