Correct way to specify rules globs?

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1

There’s a lot of different ways people are specifying the globs in rules, I’m wondering what is the official schema for them?

YAML Array

globs: ['src/**/*.ts', 'tests/**/*.ts']

or

globs:
  - 'src/**/*.ts'
  - 'tests/**/*.ts'

Single String w/ quotes

globs: 'src/**/*.ts, tests/**/*.ts'

Single string (no quotes)

globs: src/**/*.ts, tests/**/*.ts

I’m seeing lots of files with the last but I’m guessing the first format is the correct one?

Specifying this better would make a great addition to the docs.

5 Likes
2

last version works

2 Likes
3

Yeah, that’s what I’m gathering but would be great for the Cursor team to put at least one example with the correct syntax in the docs.

9 Likes
4

Will let them know

3 Likes
5

It would also be nice if the supported glob patterns were clarified. For example, does *.?(m|c)ts?(x) work?

6

Support for ignore patterns would be very nice to have

7

I found this example:

globs: *.ts

8

please document the glob syntax. no spaces after commas for example is huge as the IDE has no visual indication of a space when editing a rule.

Space after comma:

image
image1468×300 36.6 KB

No space after comma:

image
image1454×262 27.9 KB

Also syntax support for groups, optional, negate, etc would be really nice. For example, /**/*.{j,t}s?(x) or /tests/**/*.{spec,test}.{js,ts}

7 Likes
Is creating a new instance of cursor in a sub folder of my worktrees folder with sparse worktrees losing the benefit of cursor rag indexing?
9

Cursor team, please include examples in the docs for glob patterns.

1 Like
10

@deanrie any chance for this to get some highlight?

11

Hey, thanks, I’ll pass this to the team.

12

I can’t find documentation anywhere online for the globs format. This is super frustrating. Can we please get some documentation?

13

Same here — I can’t believe there’s no clear documentation on the exact syntax and format for glob rules in Cursor.

1 Like
14

+1 – not only are there not clear examples of how rule globbing is supposed to work (and this behavior seems to keep changing in the IDE), we’ve even been getting gaslighted by the cursor docs changing the specs for even how to define rule files :face_with_spiral_eyes:

Cursor rules docs over the last few weeks:

  • 2025-11-22 - docs show .cursor/rules/*.mdc structure
  • 2025-12-27 - docs start reporting .cursor/rules/<rule-name>/RULE.md structure (this appears to happen until 2026-01-10 according to wayback machine)
  • 2026-01-15 (today) - docs are back to .cursor/rules/*.mdc structure

Cursor team, please give some TLC to your cursor rules page and try to prevent your own IDE/AI from hallucinating how rules are supposed to work :folded_hands:

3 Likes
15

Cursor rules are quite unreliable IMO and will wait for the response from cursor team: I am not clear on how exactly cursor rules are applied - #3 by Luv_Agarwal

16

@Cursor Team please add the documentation here: Rules | Cursor Docs
This does not even have one example

For now, the accepted answer seems to be here: Allow escaping comma in cursor rules glob patterns - #2 by jameslamine

18

Good callout @David_Mann! I had a PR to the docs open for this a few weeks ago but it got lost. I’ll revive it.