What is Pele?
Pele is an open-source JavaScript library that draws Mermaid diagrams as SVG. kepano (Steph Ango, CEO of Obsidian) wrote it so diagrams in Obsidian draw instantly and match your theme. You give it Mermaid text; it gives back an SVG, synchronously, with no dependencies.
The short version
| Question | Pele | Mermaid.js |
|---|---|---|
| Reads | Mermaid text (targets 12.1.0) | Mermaid text |
| Download size (gzip) | about 230 kB | about 1.6 MB |
| Time to draw a diagram | 0.05–0.3 ms | 6–82 ms |
| Direct dependencies | 0 | 23 |
| On a narrow screen | changes the layout | shrinks the drawing |
| Colours | CSS variables | theme settings, then redraw |
| Works without a browser | yes, in Node | needs a browser or a headless one |
Figures are from the official site, pele.run. The demos on this site measure them live in your own browser.
Who made it, and why
Pele is by kepano, and lives in Obsidian's GitHub organisation at obsidianmd/pele. It was announced on 17 October 2026 as part of “making Obsidian insanely fast”. It is named after Pele, the Hawaiian goddess of volcanoes and fire.
What it is not
- Not a new diagram language. It reads Mermaid, so your existing diagrams, and the Mermaid that AI models already write, keep working.
- Not a drawing tool. There's no canvas to drag boxes around; for that, see Pele vs Excalidraw.
- Not a pixel-perfect Mermaid clone. It lays diagrams out its own way, so they look cleaner but different. See migrating from Mermaid.js.
How it works, in one paragraph
Pele has its own parser for each diagram type, tested against Mermaid's own parser tests and fuzzed against Mermaid's parser. It measures label text, lays the diagram out, and writes an SVG string whose colours point at CSS variables. Because each step is plain synchronous JavaScript, a diagram is ready by the time render() returns.
Is it ready to use?
It's young: version 1.0.1 shipped on 6 October 2026 and new versions arrive every few days. It was built for Obsidian. Pin an exact version in production and read the changelog on GitHub before upgrading. This site uses pele 1.6.0.