Remember fold (collapse) status

Feature requests
1

Use case or problem

Obsidian Mobile often unfolds headings when I return to a note, even when I just go to another note and come right back. This adds friction because I use folding a lot to navigate on my phone.

Proposed solution

If tracking the fold state of every note in the vault might isn’t feasible, remembering the state of the 10 most recent files (the same list that appears in Quick Switcher) would be better than nothing.

I’d like the desktop version to behave the same way — if it doesn’t already — but I don’t use desktop as much and need folding less there.

And while headings are what I’m mainly interested in, this should apply to lists too.

Current workaround

  • Keep re-folding things. :face_with_diagonal_mouth:

Related requests

Changelog

  • 2025-10-07:
    • Added “(collapse)” to title as a common synonym people search for.
    • Added headings from current FR template.
    • Added (non) workaround.
    • Downgraded “remember for only 10 most recent notes” to “better than nothing”.
    • Removed some vestiges of the old mobile-specific feature request category this was originally posted in.
7 Likes
2

I believe Obsidian remembers fold state better now than it did before — I don’t think i see it unfolding when I just go to another file and back anymore. But it does still forget sometimes — I’ll have to pay more attention to know when it tends to happen. And my desire has grown — I’ve come to wish it would always remember (tho I realize this may not be feasible across potentially thousands of files).

1 Like
3

Use case or problem

I’m coming from Notion and Notion has the collapsible option. These are GREAT for having information readily available but hidden so it doesn’t overwhelm.

Obsidian’s implementation of lists / checkboxes / headers are arguably better because all of these can collapse! This means I can choose to hide / unhide almost any section of my doc which is great.

I use this feature a lot in my notes where I want to have more details for a given step / investigation I’ve done. I can feel free to write all my notes with details in a section, knowing I can just collapse it later so it doesn’t get in the way if I don’t care ab that.

  • Todo lists
  • Runbooks
  • Work logs

My problem is that this collapse state does NOT get saved in the Markdown. This means whenever I open that file on another device or make a clone of it the collapse state is lost and now I’m left with a doc with all of its details showing up.

  • Syncing across devices
  • Making a copy of a note with collapsed lists / checkboxes / headers

Proposed solution

I am not super bullish on HOW but here are some ideas:

  • Persist in metadata and have that sync across devices / move with the copied note - I’m assuming this is how the current collapse feature works today but not sure
  • Add a hidden marker / metadata that people can use to denote a section as default open or default closed -
    • #open# vs #closed#
    • - [-] vs - [+]

Current workaround (optional)

My current workaround:

  • Just deal with it - I manually go through and close the sections I want to close
  • Rearrange my notes - moving the extra data to the bottom
  • Using the Creases plugin - I add the %% fold %% to the ones I want collapsed and then when I open the note, I run the Fold on Creases command

What is not useful to me:

  • The current collapsible sections. These have the ability to be default open or closed but they are way too large to be used in my regular notes. Some of this might just be the styling in my current theme though so potentially could just strip those away to behave like a header / list / checkbox.

Related feature requests (optional)

I’m seeing several related feature requests that are all archived but it seems like the functionality is not yet implemented?

  • Remembering heading and indent collapse in notes
4

I’m guessing you mean callouts?