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How to Make and Organize Unordered Lists in Obsidian Notes App

Obsidian is a powerful note-taking app that uses markdown formatting to allow you to easily format your notes. One of the most common formatting options you’ll use in Obsidian is unordered lists, which allow you to create bullet points to break up blocks of text.

Here’s everything you need to know about making and organizing unordered lists in Obsidian.

Creating Unordered Lists

Creating an unordered list in Obsidian is very simple. To create a bullet point, simply start a new line with a dash (-) followed by a space. Then type your bullet point text. Hit return to start a new bullet point.

For example:

  • This is my first bullet point
  • This is my second bullet point
  • This is my third bullet point

You can also use asterisks (*) instead of dashes to create bullet points. Both will render properly in Obsidian.

Indenting Bullet Points

To create a nested list with indented bullet points, simply add a tab or two spaces in front of the dash/asterisk. Each indentation level will increase the nesting of that bullet point.

For example:

  • Main bullet point 1
    • Nested bullet point 1
      • Nested bullet point 1a
    • Nested bullet point 2
  • Main bullet point 2

You can nest bullet points as many levels deep as you want to organize your notes.

Copying and Pasting Lists

When copying unordered lists from other apps and pasting them into Obsidian, you may find the indentation gets messed up.

To fix this, use the Obsidian Paste Mode plugin. This allows you to paste text, quotes, and lists at the proper indentation level based on your cursor’s position.

  1. Install the Obsidian Paste Mode plugin
  2. When pasting a list, put your cursor at the indentation level you want the list to start at
  3. Paste the list
  4. The plugin will fix the indentation so it fits properly

Changing Bullet Styles

You are not limited to basic dashes or asterisks for bullet points in Obsidian. There are two ways to customize the style of bullets used in a list:

Using the Obsidian Theme Settings

  1. Go to Settings > Appearance
  2. Under “Unordered List Style”, choose your preferred bullet style
    • Options include dashes, asterisks, circles, squares, etc.

Using CSS Snippets

For even more bullet point customization options, you can use CSS snippets.

Some popular options include:

/* Checkbox bullets */
ul {
  list-style-type: "\2610";
}

/* Arrow bullets */
ul {
  list-style-type: "\27A4"; 
}

Collapsing Bullet Point Lists

For long lists, you may want certain sections to be collapsed by default to keep your notes clean.

To create a collapsible bullet point list section in Obsidian, use the following markdown syntax:

<details>
  <summary>List Section Title</summary>

  - Bullet point 1
  - Bullet point 2
</details>

The contents between the <details> tags will be collapsed, and users can click the list section title to expand it.

You can create as many collapsible list sections as you want to organize lengthy lists.

Conclusion

With the basics of creating and formatting unordered lists covered, you should now feel comfortable using bullet points to structure your notes in Obsidian.

Unordered lists are a great way to break up walls of text and draw attention to important points. And features like indentation, plugins, custom CSS, and collapsible sections give you tons of options for organizing longer lists within Obsidian.

So put those new markdown skills to work in your notes! Adding some bullet points can go a long way in helping you and others better understand the structure of your ideas.

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