hugo/docs/content/en/content-management/front-matter.md

title	description	categories	keywords	menu	weight	toc	aliases
Front matter	Use front matter to add metadata to your content.	content management	front matter yaml toml json metadata archetypes	docs parent weight content-management 60	60	true	/content/front-matter/

Overview

The front matter at the top of each content file is metadata that:

• Describes the content
• Augments the content
• Establishes relationships with other content
• Controls the published structure of your site
• Determines template selection

Provide front matter using a serialization format, one of JSON, TOML, or YAML. Hugo determines the front matter format by examining the delimiters that separate the front matter from the page content.

See examples of front matter delimiters by toggling between the serialization formats below.

{{< code-toggle file=content/example.md fm=true >}} title = 'Example' date = 2024-02-02T04:14:54-08:00 draft = false weight = 10 [params] author = 'John Smith' {{< /code-toggle >}}

Front matter fields may be boolean, integer, float, string, arrays, or maps. Note that the TOML format also supports unquoted date/time values.

Fields

The most common front matter fields are date, draft, title, and weight, but you can specify metadata using any of fields below.

{{% note %}} The field names below are reserved. For example, you cannot create a custom field named type. Create custom fields under the params key. See the parameters section for details.

{{% /note %}}

aliases

(string array) An array of one or more aliases, where each alias is a relative URL that will redirect the browser to the current location. Access these values from a template using the Aliases method on a Page object. See the aliases section for details.

build

(map) A map of build options.

cascade

(map) 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 the cascade section for details.

date

(string) The date associated with the page, typically the creation date. Note that the TOML format also supports unquoted date/time values. See the dates section for examples. Access this value from a template using the Date method on a Page object.

description

(string) Conceptually different than the page summary, the description is typically rendered within a meta element within the head element of the published HTML file. Access this value from a template using the Description method on a Page object.

draft

(bool) If true, the page will not be rendered unless you pass the --buildDrafts flag to the hugo command. Access this value from a template using the Draft method on a Page object.

expiryDate

(string) The page expiration date. On or after the expiration date, the page will not be rendered unless you pass the --buildExpired flag to the hugo command. Note that the TOML format also supports unquoted date/time values. See the dates section for examples. Access this value from a template using the ExpiryDate method on a Page object.

headless

(bool) Applicable to leaf bundles, if true this value sets the render and list build options to never, creating a headless bundle of page resources.

isCJKLanguage

(bool) Set to true if the content language is in the CJK family. This value determines how Hugo calculates word count, and affects the values returned by the WordCount, FuzzyWordCount, ReadingTime, and Summary methods on a Page object.

keywords

(string array) An array of keywords, typically rendered within a meta element within the head element of the published HTML file, or used as a taxonomy to classify content. Access these values from a template using the Keywords method on a Page object.

{{% comment %}}

{{% /comment %}}

lastmod

(string) The date that the page was last modified. Note that the TOML format also supports unquoted date/time values. See the dates section for examples. Access this value from a template using the Lastmod method on a Page object.

layout

(string) Provide a template name to target a specific template, overriding the default template lookup order. Set the value to the base file name of the template, excluding its extension. Access this value from a template using the Layout method on a Page object.

linkTitle

(string) Typically a shorter version of the title. Access this value from a template using the LinkTitle method on a Page object.

markup

(string) An identifier corresponding to one of the supported content formats. If not provided, Hugo determines the content renderer based on the file extension.

menus

(string, string array, or map) If set, Hugo adds the page to the given menu or menus. See the menus page for details.

modified

Alias to lastmod.

outputs

(string array) The output formats to render.

{{% comment %}}

{{% /comment %}}

params

{{< new-in 0.123.0 >}}

(map) A map of custom page parameters.

pubdate

Alias to publishDate.

publishDate

(string) The page publication date. Before the publication date, the page will not be rendered unless you pass the --buildFuture flag to the hugo command. Note that the TOML format also supports unquoted date/time values. See the dates section for examples. Access this value from a template using the PublishDate method on a Page object.

published

Alias to publishDate.

resources

(map array) An array of maps to provide metadata for page resources.

sitemap

(map) A map of sitemap options. See the sitemap templates page for details. Access these values from a template using the Sitemap method on a Page object.

slug

(string) Overrides the last segment of the URL path. Not applicable to section pages. See the URL management page for details. Access this value from a template using the Slug method on a Page object.

summary

(string) Conceptually different than the page description, the summary either summarizes the content or serves as a teaser to encourage readers to visit the page. Access this value from a template using the Summary method on a Page object.

title

(string) The page title. Access this value from a template using the Title method on a Page object.

translationKey

(string) An arbitrary value used to relate two or more translations of the same page, useful when the translated pages do not share a common path. Access this value from a template using the TranslationKey method on a Page object.

type

(string) The content type, overriding the value derived from the top level section in which the page resides. Access this value from a template using the Type method on a Page object.

unpublishdate

Alias to expirydate.

url

(string) Overrides the entire URL path. Applicable to regular pages and section pages. See the URL management page for details.

weight

(int) The page weight, used to order the page within a page collection. Access this value from a template using the Weight method on a Page object.

Parameters

{{< new-in 0.123.0 >}}

Specify custom page parameters under the params key in front matter:

{{< code-toggle file=content/example.md fm=true >}} title = 'Example' date = 2024-02-02T04:14:54-08:00 draft = false weight = 10 [params] author = 'John Smith' {{< /code-toggle >}}

Access these values from a template using the Params or Param method on a Page object.

Hugo provides [embedded templates] to optionally insert meta data within the head element of your rendered pages. These embedded templates expect the following front matter parameters:

Parameter	Data type	Used by these embedded templates
audio	[]string	[opengraph.html]
images	[]string	[opengraph.html], [schema.html], [twitter_cards.html]
videos	[]string	[opengraph.html]

The embedded templates will skip a parameter if not provided in front matter, but will throw an error if the data type is unexpected.

[opengraph.html]: {{% eturl opengraph %}} [schema.html]: {{% eturl schema %}} [twitter_cards.html]: {{% eturl twitter_cards %}} [embedded templates]: /templates/embedded/

Taxonomies

Classify content by adding taxonomy terms to front matter. For example, with this site configuration:

{{< code-toggle file=hugo >}} [taxonomies] tag = 'tags' genre = 'genres' {{< /code-toggle >}}

Add taxonomy terms as shown below:

{{< code-toggle file=content/example.md fm=true >}} title = 'Example' date = 2024-02-02T04:14:54-08:00 draft = false weight = 10 tags = ['red','blue'] genres = ['mystery','romance'] [params] author = 'John Smith' {{< /code-toggle >}}

You can add taxonomy terms to the front matter of any these page kinds:

• home
• page
• section
• taxonomy
• term

Access taxonomy terms from a template using the Params or GetTerms method on a Page object. For example:

{{< code file=layouts/_default/single.html >}} {{ with .GetTerms "tags" }}

Tags

{{ range . }}
• {{ .LinkTitle }}
{{ end }}

{{ end }} {{< /code >}}

Cascade

Any node can pass down to its descendants a set of front matter values.

Target specific pages

The cascade block can be an array with an optional _target keyword, allowing you to target different page sets while cascading values.

{{< code-toggle file=content/_index.md fm=true >}} title ="Home" [cascade] [cascade.params] background = "yosemite.jpg" [cascade._target] path="/articles/**" lang="en" kind="page" [cascade] [cascade.params] background = "goldenbridge.jpg" [cascade._target] kind="section" {{</ code-toggle >}}

Use any combination of these keywords to target a set of pages:

path

(string) A 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

(string) A Glob pattern matching the Page's Kind(s), e.g. "{home,section}".

lang

(string) A Glob pattern matching the Page's language, e.g. "{en,sv}".

environment

(string) A Glob pattern matching the build environment, e.g. "{production,development}"

Any of the above can be omitted.

{{% note %}} With a multilingual site it may be more efficient to define the cascade values in your site configuration to avoid duplicating the cascade values on the section, taxonomy, or term page for each language.

With a multilingual site, if you choose to define the cascade values in front matter, you must create a section, taxonomy, or term page for each language; the lang keyword is ignored. {{% /note %}}

Example

{{< code-toggle file=content/posts/_index.md fm=true >}} date = 2024-02-01T21:25:36-08:00 title = 'Posts' cascade [cascade.params] banner = 'images/typewriter.jpg' {{</ code-toggle >}}

With the above example the posts 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.

Emacs Org Mode

If your content format is Emacs Org Mode, you may provide front matter using Org Mode keywords. For example:

{{< code file=content/example.org lang=text >}} #+TITLE: Example #+DATE: 2024-02-02T04:14:54-08:00 #+DRAFT: false #+AUTHOR: John Smith #+GENRES: mystery #+GENRES: romance #+TAGS: red #+TAGS: blue #+WEIGHT: 10 {{< /code >}}

Note that you can also specify array elements on a single line:

{{< code file=content/example.org lang=text >}} #+TAGS[]: red blue {{< /code >}}

Dates

When populating a date field, whether a custom page parameter or one of the four predefined fields (date, expiryDate, lastmod, publishDate), use one of these parsable formats:

{{% include "functions/time/_common/parsable-date-time-strings.md" %}}

To override the default time zone, set the timeZone in your site configuration. The order of precedence for determining the time zone is:

1. The time zone offset in the date/time string
2. The time zone specified in your site configuration
3. The Etc/UTC time zone