Properties#

Properties are custom metadata fields you can add to any note. They live in the note's front matter and let you organise notes beyond tags and folders — tracking status, priority, categories, deadlines, or anything else your workflow needs.

New: add properties on iPhone and iPad

Your notes' properties now sit right at the top of each note — on the Mac, iPhone, iPad and iPhone Duo. On iPhone and iPad you can add properties to a note and change their values, wherever you are: tap Add property, pick one, and set it.

Properties themselves — their names, types and options — are created and managed on the Mac, in the Property Manager. That keeps every note in your collection using the same properties in the same way, so your Database Views and queries stay tidy. Set them up once on the Mac, and they're ready on every device.

Properties at the Top of Your Notes#

A note's properties sit above its first line and scroll with the note. Each row shows a property's name, then its value — change a value right where it stands:

Text, numbers, links, email addresses and phone numbers — type in place. A number can be typed as you'd write it: 80,000 or $1,250.50 keeps the number.
Dates — pick a day on a calendar. For a date and time, set the time too.
Single Select and Multi Select — choose from the property's options.
Checkbox and Rating — a click or a tap.

On the Mac, a link, email address or phone number has a button at the end of its row that opens it.

An orange dot after a property's name means its value breaks one of the property's validation rules: it's required but empty, a number is outside its range, or text is longer than allowed. The reason shows in orange beside the value — for example, 200 · At most 100.

Fold them away with the arrow beside Properties. FoldNotes remembers, note by note, on each device. To show or hide them:

macOS — the Properties button on the bottom toolbar, View → Show Properties (Ctrl+Option+Cmd+P), or Show Properties in the / command palette.
iPhone and iPad — Show Properties in the ⋯ menu, or in the / command palette.

On a note with no properties, Show Properties opens an empty block so you can add one. On the Mac, properties are hidden in Zen mode.

Adding a Property to a Note#

Click or tap Add property at the foot of the properties — or choose Add Property in the / command palette.
Pick a property. The list shows your collection's properties that the note doesn't have yet.
Set its value.

The property is added to the note once it has a value. Change your mind — close the list, the calendar or the field without choosing anything — and nothing is added. The same goes if you choose a value and then clear it before closing. A checkbox is added straight away, unticked.

This works the same on the Mac, iPhone and iPad. New properties are created on the Mac, in the Property Manager.

Removing a Property from a Note#

macOS — move the pointer over the row and click the × at its end.
iPhone and iPad — touch and hold the row, then choose Remove from Note.

The property stays in your collection, and other notes keep their values.

Validation Rules#

Validation rules keep a property's values consistent across your notes. You set them on the Mac, in the Property Manager: select a property and use its validation settings.

Rule	For	What it checks
Required	Any type	Once the property is on a note, it has a value
Minimum and Maximum	Number	The number is within the range
Maximum length	Text, URL, Email, Phone	The text is no longer than the limit

When a value breaks a rule, an orange dot appears after the property's name at the top of the note, and the reason appears in orange beside the value: Required, At least 0, At most 100 or At most 20 characters. It's the same on the Mac, iPhone and iPad. While you type a number, the reason follows what you type, and shows Not a number if it isn't one; finish on something that isn't a number and the value you had is kept. With VoiceOver, the reason is read out with the name.

The rules are advisory: FoldNotes always keeps the value you entered, so nothing is lost while you fix it.

Properties You Can See but Not Change#

Some properties show read-only:

Properties the Property Manager doesn't know — for example, ones another app such as Obsidian added. To change them in FoldNotes, create a property with the same name in the Property Manager.
Text over several lines, and nested properties — FoldNotes keeps these exactly as written.

In the Preview#

While a note's properties are showing at its top, the preview shows them too, above the note, read-only. Fold them away in the note and the preview hides them. Exports, sharing and print leave them out.

Property Types#

Type	Example Value	How You Set It
Text	`meeting notes`	Typed in place
Number	`5000`	Typed in place
Date	`2026-05-15`	Calendar
Date + Time	`2026-05-15T14:30`	Calendar and time
Checkbox	`true`	Checkbox
Single Select	`draft`	One of the property's options
Multi Select	`swift, ios`	Several of the property's options
URL	`https://example.com`	Typed in place
Email	`[email protected]`	Typed in place
Phone	`+61 412 345 678`	Typed in place
Rating	`4`	Stars (1–5)

Select Properties#

Single Select and Multi Select properties have a defined set of options shared across your collection. Manage the options in the Property Manager on the Mac. On the Mac, the list of options at the top of a note ends with Edit options in the Property Manager….

How Properties Are Stored#

Each property's value is written into the note itself, as a key-value pair in its YAML front matter:

---
id: 8A3F2B1C-...
created: 2026-04-03T10:30:00Z
title: Project Plan
status: in-progress      # Single Select
priority: high           # Single Select
budget: 12000            # Number
deadline: 2026-06-01     # Date
reviewed: true           # Checkbox
rating: 4                # Rating
---

Its definition (name, type, options and rules) is kept with your collection and managed by FoldNotes. Change it only in the Property Manager: editing FoldNotes' own files in another app can hide your properties, or leave your notes out of step with them.

FoldNotes supports a subset of YAML: text, numbers, dates, true or false, and lists. Text over several lines and nested properties are kept exactly as written.

Single-value properties are written as ordinary YAML scalars — a Number is a number, a Date is a date, a Checkbox is true/false. Any tool that reads Markdown front matter sees the correct value, and because FoldNotes knows each property's type it can sort, filter, and calculate on them (see Properties in Database Views).

Properties from other apps are kept. When FoldNotes saves a note, the properties another app wrote come back as they were written — lists one item per line, text over several lines and nested properties included. FoldNotes writes a note's properties in A to Z order.

Multi Select values

FoldNotes reads a list in either YAML form — [swift, ios], or one item per line, as Obsidian writes it — and keeps each note's list in the form it has.

A new Multi Select value is written comma-separated on a single line:

tags: swift, ios, testing

That's easy to read, but a strict YAML reader treats it as one string rather than a list. Writing new lists as a true YAML sequence — tags: [swift, ios, testing] — is planned.

Use Cases#

Content Status#

Track where each note is in your writing process:

Property: status (Single Select)
Options: draft, in-progress, review, published
Workflow: Create a Database View filtered to status = draft to see everything that needs work.

Project Management#

Organise project-related notes:

priority (Single Select) — high, medium, low
category (Single Select) — design, engineering, marketing
deadline (Date) — When the work is due

Reading List#

Track articles, books, or references:

source (URL) — Link to the original
read (Checkbox) — Whether you've finished it
rating (Number) — Your score out of 10

Meeting Notes#

attendees (Text) — Who was there
meeting-date (Date) — When it happened
action-items (Checkbox) — Whether follow-ups are complete

Properties in Database Views#

Properties become powerful when combined with Database Views. Because each property is typed, a view can compute on the values, not just display them. You can:

Filter notes by property values, including numeric and date comparisons (e.g. budget > 5000, or deadline before a given date)
Sort by property (e.g. sort by deadline ascending)
Display properties as columns in the table view
Compute columns — derive a value from other properties, including arithmetic across Number fields
Aggregate — a footer row totals a column (sum, average, count) across the notes in the view

To add a property column to a Database View, use the column configuration menu; computed and aggregate columns are configured the same way.

Properties via the CLI#

The fn command-line tool can read and write properties:

# View a note's properties
fn show "Project Plan" --properties

# Set a property
fn edit "Project Plan" --set-property "status:in-progress"

# Remove a property
fn edit "Project Plan" --remove-property "status"

# List notes filtered by property
fn list --property "status=draft"

See the Command Reference for full details.

Property Manager (macOS)#

The Property Manager is where your collection's properties are created and managed. Open it via View > Manage Properties or Cmd+Option+P. Every property you make here is ready to add to notes on the Mac, iPhone and iPad.

What You Can Do#

Create properties — Click + to add a new property definition with a name and type. A name can't contain a colon or a line break, or start with a dash: front matter can't hold those as a property's name.
Rename properties — Edit the name field in the detail pane. The rename is propagated to all notes that use the property. A name another property already uses is refused, and your notes are left as they were.
Delete properties — Click − to remove a property definition. A confirmation dialog shows how many notes use it.
Edit select options — For Single Select and Multi Select properties, a two-column editor shows current values alongside editable new values. Renamed options are highlighted and propagated to all notes.
Set validation rules — Mark properties as required, set min/max values for numbers, or max length for text fields. See Validation Rules.
View usage — Each property shows a count of how many notes use it.

How Changes Propagate#

When you rename a property or one of its options, FoldNotes updates every note that uses it: open notes, closed notes, and notes in the Trash.

Changes to select options are saved when you select a different property, close the window, or quit the app.

Good to Know#

Collection-wide schema — Property definitions are shared across all notes. If you create a status property, it's available on every note.
Portable — Single-value properties are written as standard YAML scalars, so other Markdown tools read them directly. (A new Multi Select value is currently comma-separated; see How Properties Are Stored.)
System fields are protected — FoldNotes reserves fields prefixed with fn- for internal use. Your custom properties cannot collide with these.
Validation is advisory — a value that breaks one of its validation rules shows an orange dot and the reason at the top of the note, but it is never prevented from saving.
One line per value — a value is kept on one line: paste text with line breaks into a value and they become spaces.
Created on the Mac, used everywhere — Properties are created and managed in the Property Manager on the Mac. Adding them to notes and changing their values works on the Mac, iPhone and iPad.

Get the most from properties

Set up your properties on the Mac — names, types, options and validation — and they sync to iPhone and iPad via iCloud. There you can add them to notes, change their values at the top of each note, and see them in your Database Views.