Pinned Tabs Row

An Obsidian plugin that gives pinned tabs their own compact row above the normal tab bar, similar to VS Code and IntelliJ.

Features

• Pinned tabs sit in a quiet, content-sized row above the normal tab bar
• The normal tab row keeps Obsidian's native sizing, active-tab shape, close button, drag-and-drop, context menu, and tab list
• A full-width divider separates the two rows
• Compact pinned tabs option: pinned tabs become a narrow icon strip
• The layout only appears when a tab group has both pinned and unpinned tabs. No pinned tabs, or all tabs pinned, leave the native bar untouched
• Sidebar tab bars and stacked tabs are not affected
• Works in popout windows
• Commands:
  • Pin or unpin current tab
  • Unpin all tabs
  • Show or hide pinned row

Screenshots

Active pinned tab, Minimal dark:

Compact pinned tabs with title badges, Minimal dark:

Many pinned tabs on one row, Minimal dark:

Split panes keep their normal tab rows aligned:

Requirements

• Obsidian 1.15.0 or later
• Desktop only. Obsidian hides the tab bar on phones, so this plugin has no effect there.

Installation

1. Open Settings → Community plugins
2. Select Browse, search for Pinned Tabs Row
3. Install and enable the plugin

For local development, see Development.

Usage

• Right-click a tab → Pin (or run Pin or unpin current tab)
• Pinned tabs move to their own row above the normal tabs
• Click the pin icon on a pinned tab to unpin it
• Optional: enable Compact pinned tabs in plugin settings for an icon-only strip. Hover a compact tab to see its title.

Development

pnpm install
pnpm dev      # watch mode
pnpm build    # typecheck + production bundle
pnpm lint     # eslint
pnpm check    # lint + build

UI tests

The UI suite launches an isolated Obsidian instance with its own profile and a test vault in test/vault-template. It creates tabs through the Obsidian API, checks layout invariants, and writes screenshots and a report to test/artifacts.

pnpm test:ui
pnpm test:ui:clean

The suite covers default dark/light and Minimal dark/light themes, mixed pinned/unpinned tabs, drag reordering, compact mode, long titles, many tabs, many pinned tabs, narrow windows, canvas tabs, split panes, sidebars, stacked tabs, settings changes, settings persistence, commands, plugin reload, and popout windows.

See test/README.md for details.

Releasing

1. Bump version in manifest.json and add the matching entry to versions.json
2. pnpm build
3. Tag the release with the exact version (no v prefix) and attach main.js, manifest.json, and styles.css

License

0BSD