Previous Daily note not working

Steps to reproduce

  1. Created new vault. Default Obsidian: no plug-ins/themes or snippets.
  2. Create folder at root level: Today
  3. Create folder tree at root level: Diary/2026/01
  4. Settings/Daily Note/Custom Date Format: YYYY-MM-DD-ddd
  5. In Folder: Diary/2026/01 Create a yesterdays note with the correct note name for the previous day. eg: 2026-01-27-Tue
  6. Settings/Daily Note/New File Location: Today
  7. Command Palette: Daily Notes: Open Today’s Daily Notes (New note create in Folder Today with filename: 2026-01-28-Wed
  8. Command Palette: Daily Notes: Open previous daily note.
  9. Error toast appears: “There’s no daily note before this one”

Did you follow the troubleshooting guide? [Y/N]

Yes. Trouble shooting guide followed.

Expected result

Expected the previous daily note “2026-01-27-Tue” to appear in edit window.

Actual result

Error toast appears: “There’s no daily note before this one”

Environment


SYSTEM INFO:
Obsidian version: v1.11.5
Installer version: v1.11.5
Operating system: #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Debian 6.12.63-1 (2025-12-30) 6.12.63+deb13-amd64
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

Previously, could navigate backward from today’s daily note to previous and keep stepping backwards through daily notes. Could also navigate forward through daily notes. This navigate forward no longer works either.

This bug report applies to Android also.

Hello,

Sorry for the late reply, there was a similar BR and that was marked as closed.

We reworked the daily note section in v1.12 and I am unable unable to reproduce your problem.

Download and reinstall Obsidian.
If you still have this problem, create a new vault, set up the daily notes and take a screenshot of how you configured it, and post it here.

I’m experiencing the same issue, with the option (whether specified custom or not) `YYYY-MM-DD` on this version:

SYSTEM INFO:
Obsidian version: 1.12.4
Installer version: 1.12.4
Operating system: Darwin Kernel Version 25.2.0: Tue Nov 18 21:09:56 PST 2025; root:xnu-12377.61.12~1/RELEASE_ARM64_T6041 25.2.0

The previous day daily note must exist, does it?

If it does and you have this problem, kindly make a screen recording, upload it somewhere and share the link here or in a DM.

Sorry, I missed this. I can make a screen recording, but basically, if you make an explicit link, eg “[[2026-03-03]]” then that finds “/0.Journal/2026/03/2026-03-03.md” and it works, but the previous daily feature seems to expect precisely “/0.Journal/2026-03-03.md” as that is the location + format it would use to create the file.

So, it works as long as you don’t have our exact workflow of having open/un-reviewed days and then filing them away deeper when you’ve cleaned them up.

What you are descripting is a different from the OP problems (which was a bug).

You want Obsidian to detect that a particular link, is not just generic link, but a link to non yet existent daily note and the note should be created in the appropriate daily note folder.

There is a FR for this already

No, new notes are a separate issue. If I have

  • the daily folder set to “/daily/”,
  • a note in another folder, “/daily/2026/01/2026-01-01.md” and
  • notes in the daily folder, “/daily/2026-01-02.md” and “/daily/2026-01-03.md”

Going between 02 and 03 works, but 01 doesn’t.

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