At People

A lightweight Obsidian plugin that lets you mention people with @, just like you would in a chat or social media. Type @ followed by a name, pick from the suggestions, and a wiki-link is inserted automatically.

Features

• Smart fuzzy search — finds people even with partial input, typos in word order, or accent differences
  • "john" matches John Doe
  • "jose" matches José García
  • "jd" matches John Doe (initials)
  • "doe jo" matches John Doe (multi-word)
• Frontmatter aliases — match people by nicknames or alternate names defined in their YAML frontmatter (opt-in)
• Alias as display text — optionally show a person's alias as the visible link text (e.g. a link to @john-doe displays as Uncle John) while the link still points to the file (opt-in)
• Backlink-based ranking — people you reference often appear higher in suggestions, with a slight recency boost for recently edited notes
• Link selected text — select any text, run the command "At People: Link selected text to person" from the palette, and convert it into a person link instantly. Assign a hotkey (e.g. Ctrl+Shift+A) for even faster linking.
• Dismiss with Escape — press Esc to dismiss suggestions; they won't reappear until you type a new @
• Auto-create files — optionally create person files and folders on the fly when selecting a suggestion
• Flexible folder modes — store people as flat files, per-person folders, or grouped by last name
• Styleable links — person links get the at-person CSS class and a data-at-person attribute in both Reading view and Live Preview, so you can format them with your own CSS (e.g. as @-pills); an optional built-in pill style is included

Installation

From Community Plugins

1. Open At People in the Obsidian plugin directory, or go to Settings > Community plugins and search for "At People"
2. Click Install, then Enable

Manual

1. Download the latest release from Releases
2. Extract to <vault>/.obsidian/plugins/at-people/
3. Reload Obsidian and enable the plugin in Settings > Community plugins

Important: file naming

By default, person files must start with @ in their filename:

People/
  @John Doe.md
  @Sarah Connor.md

The @ prefix clearly distinguishes person notes from regular notes in your vault.

If your people files don't use @ (e.g. you already have a folder of contacts named John Doe.md), you can disable Require @ prefix in settings. The plugin will then treat every .md file inside your people folder — including subfolders — as a person.

Warning: with the prefix disabled, make sure your people folder contains only person files. Any .md file in it will appear in suggestions.

Configuration

People folder

Set the folder where your person files live (e.g. People/, Contacts/, Reference/People/). The plugin scans this folder and all subfolders for person files.

Explicit links

By default, the plugin inserts simple links:

[[@John Doe]]

Enable Explicit links to include the full path:

[[People/@John Doe.md|@John Doe]]

Auto-create files

When enabled, selecting a suggestion automatically creates the person file (and any necessary folders) in your configured people folder. When disabled, the plugin inserts the link but you need to create the file yourself.

Tip: If you use Templater, you can assign a template to your people folder in Templater's settings (Folder Templates). Every new person file created by At People will then be pre-filled with your template automatically.

Folder mode

Choose how person files are organized:

Per Person and Per Lastname modes require Explicit links to be enabled.

Note on last names: the plugin takes the last word of the name as the last name. "Charles Le Fabre" becomes "Fabre", not "Le Fabre".

Include aliases

Disabled by default. When enabled, the plugin reads the aliases field from each person file's YAML frontmatter and includes them in the search. For example, if @María García.md contains:

---
aliases:
  - Mary
  - mamá
---

Typing @Mary or @mamá will suggest María García. The suggestion shows the matched alias so you know why it appeared (e.g. María García (via Mary)). The inserted link always points to the canonical person name.

Use alias as display text

Off by default, and only available when Include aliases is enabled. Controls whether a generated link uses a person's frontmatter alias as the visible text. The link target never changes; only the displayed text does:

• Off — always use the file name.
• Always prefer alias — use an alias whenever the person has one.
• Only when matched by alias — use the alias only when you searched by it; searching by the file name keeps the file name.

For example, if @john-doe.md has the alias Uncle John, the inserted link becomes [[@john-doe|Uncle John]]. A person with no alias always uses the file name.

Require @ prefix

Enabled by default. When enabled, only files starting with @ are recognized as people. When disabled, all .md files in the people folder are treated as people. See file naming for details.

Style person links as pills

Disabled by default. When enabled, person links are shown as tag-style pills in Reading view and Live Preview, reusing your theme's tag colors (a pill with @ instead of #). Prefer your own look? See Styling person links below.

Styling person links

In both Reading view and Live Preview, every person link receives:

• the CSS class at-person
• a data-at-person="<name>" attribute holding the person's name (without the @ prefix)

This lets you target person links from your own CSS snippet or theme. For example, to render them as pills with @ instead of #:

.at-person {
    background-color: var(--tag-background);
    color: var(--tag-color);
    font-size: var(--tag-size);
    padding: var(--tag-padding-y) var(--tag-padding-x);
    border-radius: var(--tag-radius);
    text-decoration: none;
}

To style a specific person, use the data attribute:

.at-person[data-at-person="Jane Doe"] {
    color: var(--color-red);
}

Don't want to write CSS? Enable Style person links as pills in settings for a built-in version of the look above.

How ranking works

Results are ranked by combining three factors: how closely the query matches the name (with a slight preference for shorter, more precise matches), how often the person is referenced across your vault, and a light recency boost for recently edited person notes. Frequently mentioned people naturally rise to the top, while still respecting the relevance of your current query.

Conflicts

Some plugins conflict with the @ symbol. Check the known plugin conflicts to see if yours is listed.

Comparison

Choose At People if you want a fast, focused solution for person linking. Choose At Symbol Linking if you need broader symbol-to-folder mapping.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome. Please open an issue first to discuss major changes.

Contributors

Originally created by saibotsivad, who generously transferred maintenance in October 2025 when the original repository was archived.

• saibotsivad — Original author and creator
• ph4wks — Folder mode variations and auto-file creation
• hExPY — Additional enhancements
• backmind — Current maintainer: fuzzy search, accent-insensitive matching, backlink ranking (v1.1.0+)

License

Published under the MIT License.