Ripgrep Search

Ripgrep Search is an MCP server that connects Claude to local Obsidian vaults using the ripgrep command-line engine. Built for researchers, knowledge workers, and personal knowledge management practitioners, it enables language models to quickly perform text searches, backlink lookups, and vault maintenance across markdown collections. The server recognizes Obsidian-specific markdown features including wikilinks, nested YAML frontmatter properties, and markdown headings. When presenting search matches, it supplies contextual information such as the closest section header or specific frontmatter key containing the match. Users can inspect outgoing and incoming internal links, track external URLs, trace backlinks to specific documents, isolate unlinked notes, and filter documents by modification dates or folder paths. Because it relies on native ripgrep binary operations under the hood, the server delivers rapid matching across extensive note directories without requiring dedicated background indexing services or cloud-hosted search infrastructure.

Category: Files, Documents & PDFs

Tags: grep, obsidian, ripgrep, search, vault

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How to install and configure Ripgrep Search

1. Ensure Python 3.8 or higher is installed, along with ripgrep accessible in your system PATH. 2. Clone the repository and install the server: bash git clone https://github.com/kpetrovsky/kp-ripgrep-mcp.git cd kp-ripgrep-mcp pip install -e . 3. Open your Claude Desktop configuration file (~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json on macOS or %APPDATA%/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json on Windows). 4. Add the server configuration under mcpServers pointing to your absolute vault path: json { "mcpServers": { "obsidian-search": { "command": "python", "args": ["-m", "rgrep_mcp.server"], "env": { "OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH": "/path/to/your/obsidian/vault" } } } } 5. Restart Claude Desktop to activate the tools.

What you can do with Ripgrep Search

• Search notes within specific directories while restricting matches strictly to note body text or YAML frontmatter. - Discover all incoming backlinks and surrounding reference contexts that point to a designated target note. - Locate orphaned markdown files in your Obsidian vault that lack both incoming and outgoing links. - Scan vault links to identify broken connections, target titles, or specific external URL patterns using regex. - Retrieve notes modified within specific YYYY-MM-DD date windows to review recent updates or daily logs.

Key facts

• Open Source
• https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep
• Files, Documents & PDFs, Notes & Knowledge Management
• grep, obsidian, ripgrep, search, vault

Part of MCP Servers

How do I install Ripgrep Search?

Install Python 3.8 and the ripgrep binary on your machine. Clone the kp-ripgrep-mcp repository, install it using pip install -e ., and add the obsidian-search definition with your absolute OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH into Claude Desktop configuration file.

What tools are included with Ripgrep Search?

The server includes tools named rg_search_notes for targeted text discovery, rg_search_links for analyzing wikilinks and URLs, rg_search_backlinks for locating incoming note connections, rg_search_recent_notes for date-based file lookups, and rg_search_orphaned_notes for finding isolated documents.

Does Ripgrep Search understand Obsidian frontmatter?

Yes, it parses YAML frontmatter and provides smart context detection. It can limit searches exclusively to frontmatter fields, search nested YAML structures, and return the specific key name where a text match occurred.

Which MCP clients work with Ripgrep Search?

Ripgrep Search works with Claude Desktop on macOS and Windows, as well as any compatible MCP client that can run a Python process and pass the OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH environment variable.

Is Ripgrep Search open source?

Yes, Ripgrep Search is open source and distributed under the terms of the MIT License.