--- title: Front matter description: Hugo allows you to add front matter in yaml, toml, or json to your content files. categories: [content management] keywords: [front matter,yaml,toml,json,metadata,archetypes] menu: docs: parent: content-management weight: 60 weight: 60 toc: true aliases: [/content/front-matter/] --- **Front matter** allows you to keep metadata attached to an instance of a [content type]---i.e., embedded inside a content file---and is one of the many features that gives Hugo its strength. {{< youtube Yh2xKRJGff4 >}} ## Front matter formats Hugo supports four formats for front matter, each with their own identifying tokens. TOML : identified by opening and closing `+++`. YAML : identified by opening and closing `---`. JSON : a single JSON object surrounded by '`{`' and '`}`', followed by a new line. ORG : a group of Org mode keywords in the format '`#+KEY: VALUE`'. Any line that does not start with `#+` ends the front matter section. Array values can either be separated into multiple lines (`#+KEY: VALUE_1` and `#+KEY: VALUE_2`) or a whitespace separated list of strings (`#+KEY[]: VALUE_1 VALUE_2`). ### Example {{< code-toggle >}} title = "spf13-vim 3.0 release and new website" description = "spf13-vim is a cross platform distribution of vim plugins and resources for Vim." tags = [ ".vimrc", "plugins", "spf13-vim", "vim" ] date = "2012-04-06" categories = [ "Development", "VIM" ] slug = "spf13-vim-3-0-release-and-new-website" {{< /code-toggle >}} ## Front matter variables ### Predefined There are a few predefined variables that Hugo is aware of. See [Page Variables][pagevars] for how to call many of these predefined variables in your templates. aliases : An array of one or more aliases (e.g., old published paths of renamed content) that will be created in the output directory structure . See [Aliases][aliases] for details. audio : An array of paths to audio files related to the page; used by the `opengraph` [internal template](/templates/internal) to populate `og:audio`. cascade : A map of front matter keys whose values are passed down to the page's descendants unless overwritten by self or a closer ancestor's cascade. See [Front Matter Cascade](#front-matter-cascade) for details. date : The datetime assigned to this page. This is usually fetched from the `date` field in front matter, but this behavior is configurable. description : The description for the content. draft : If `true`, the content will not be rendered unless the `--buildDrafts` flag is passed to the `hugo` command. expiryDate : The datetime at which the content should no longer be published by Hugo; expired content will not be rendered unless the `--buildExpired` flag is passed to the `hugo` command. headless : If `true`, sets a leaf bundle to be [headless][headless-bundle]. images : An array of paths to images related to the page; used by [internal templates](/templates/internal) such as `_internal/twitter_cards.html`. isCJKLanguage : If `true`, Hugo will explicitly treat the content as a CJK language; both `.Summary` and `.WordCount` work properly in CJK languages. keywords : The meta keywords for the content. layout : The layout Hugo should select from the [lookup order][lookup] when rendering the content. If a `type` is not specified in the front matter, Hugo will look for the layout of the same name in the layout directory that corresponds with a content's section. See [Content Types][content type]. lastmod : The datetime at which the content was last modified. linkTitle : Used for creating links to content; if set, Hugo defaults to using the `linkTitle` before the `title`. markup : **experimental**; specify `"rst"` for reStructuredText (requires`rst2html`) or `"md"` (default) for Markdown. outputs : Allows you to specify output formats specific to the content. See [output formats][outputs]. publishDate : If in the future, content will not be rendered unless the `--buildFuture` flag is passed to `hugo`. resources : Used for configuring page bundle resources. See [Page Resources][page-resources]. series : An array of series this page belongs to, as a subset of the `series` [taxonomy](/content-management/taxonomies/); used by the `opengraph` [internal template](/templates/internal) to populate `og:see_also`. slug : Overrides the last segment of the URL path. Not applicable to section pages. See [URL Management](/content-management/urls/#slug) for details. summary : Text used when providing a summary of the article in the `.Summary` page variable; details available in the [content-summaries](/content-management/summaries/) section. title : The title for the content. type : The type of the content; this value will be automatically derived from the directory (i.e., the [section]) if not specified in front matter. url : Overrides the entire URL path. Applicable to regular pages and section pages. See [URL Management](/content-management/urls/#url) for details. videos : An array of paths to videos related to the page; used by the `opengraph` [internal template](/templates/internal) to populate `og:video`. weight : used for [ordering your content in lists][ordering]. Lower weight gets higher precedence. So content with lower weight will come first. If set, weights should be non-zero, as 0 is interpreted as an *unset* weight. {{% note %}} If neither `slug` nor `url` is present and [permalinks are not configured otherwise in your site configuration file](/content-management/urls/#permalinks), Hugo will use the file name of your content to create the output URL. See [Content Organization](/content-management/organization) for an explanation of paths in Hugo and [URL Management](/content-management/urls/) for ways to customize Hugo's default behaviors. {{% /note %}} ### User-defined You can add fields to your front matter arbitrarily to meet your needs. These user-defined key-values are placed into a single `.Params` variable for use in your templates. The following fields can be accessed via `.Params.include_toc` and `.Params.show_comments`, respectively. The [Variables] section provides more information on using Hugo's page- and site-level variables in your templates. {{< code-toggle >}} include_toc: true show_comments: false {{}} ## Front matter cascade Any node or section can pass down to descendants a set of front matter values as long as defined underneath the reserved `cascade` front matter key. ### Target specific pages The `cascade` block can be a slice with a optional `_target` keyword, allowing for multiple `cascade` values targeting different page sets. {{< code-toggle >}} title ="Blog" [[cascade]] background = "yosemite.jpg" [cascade._target] path="/blog/**" lang="en" kind="page" [[cascade]] background = "goldenbridge.jpg" [cascade._target] kind="section" {{}} Keywords available for `_target`: path : A [Glob](https://github.com/gobwas/glob) pattern matching the content path below /content. Expects Unix-styled slashes. Note that this is the virtual path, so it starts at the mount root. The matching supports double-asterisks so you can match for patterns like `/blog/*/**` to match anything from the third level and down. kind : A Glob pattern matching the Page's Kind(s), e.g. "{home,section}". lang : A Glob pattern matching the Page's language, e.g. "{en,sv}". environment : A Glob pattern matching the build environment, e.g. "{production,development}" Any of the above can be omitted. {{% note %}} When making a site that supports multiple languages, defining a `[[cascade]]` is recommended to be done in [Site Config](../../getting-started/configuration/#cascade) to prevent duplication. If you instead define a `[[cascade]]` in front matter for multiple languages, an `content/XX/foo/_index.md` file needs to be made on a per-language basis, with `XX` the glob pattern matching the Page's language. In this case, the **lang** keyword is ignored. {{% /note %}} ### Example In `content/blog/_index.md` {{< code-toggle >}} title: Blog cascade: banner: images/typewriter.jpg {{}} With the above example the Blog section page and its descendants will return `images/typewriter.jpg` when `.Params.banner` is invoked unless: - Said descendant has its own `banner` value set - Or a closer ancestor node has its own `cascade.banner` value set. ## Order content through front matter You can assign content-specific `weight` in the front matter of your content. These values are especially useful for [ordering][ordering] in list views. You can use `weight` for ordering of content and the convention of [`_weight`][taxweight] for ordering content within a taxonomy. See [Ordering and Grouping Hugo Lists][lists] to see how `weight` can be used to organize your content in list views. ## Override global markdown configuration It's possible to set some options for Markdown rendering in a content's front matter as an override to the [rendering options set in your project configuration][config]. ## Front matter format specs - [TOML Spec][toml] - [YAML Spec][yaml] - [JSON Spec][json] [variables]: /variables/ [aliases]: /content-management/urls/#aliases [archetype]: /content-management/archetypes/ [config]: /getting-started/configuration/ [content type]: /content-management/types/ [contentorg]: /content-management/organization/ [headless-bundle]: /content-management/page-bundles/#headless-bundle [json]: https://www.ecma-international.org/publications/files/ECMA-ST/ECMA-404.pdf [lists]: /templates/lists/#sort-content [lookup]: /templates/lookup-order/ [ordering]: /templates/lists/ [outputs]: /templates/output-formats/ [page-resources]: /content-management/page-resources/ [pagevars]: /variables/page/ [section]: /content-management/sections/ [taxweight]: /content-management/taxonomies/ [toml]: https://toml.io/ [urls]: /content-management/urls/ [variables]: /variables/ [yaml]: https://yaml.org/spec/