What's New

From a clearer search window to finding files without remembering their names, discover how 3.1.0 and 3.2.0 make everyday searches easier.

3.2.0 — Find it, even when you forget the name

✨ Search file contents in your own words

Remember a scene in a photo, a message in a screenshot or a topic in a document? Describe it in AI Search to find related photos, screenshots, PDFs, documents and ebooks—without having to recall the file name.

• “A dog on the beach”—find the photo you have in mind.
• “Payment declined error”—find a screenshot you saved.
• “The clause about pets in the lease”—find the document and relevant page.
• “A zebra in a video”—find the matching moment in a clip.

👀 Find and preview together

A new side-by-side preview helps you check a result as soon as you select it. Narrow results by file type, see matching document pages or video moments, then open the file or use Quick Look with less switching between windows.

🔒 Your files and searches stay on your Mac

AI Search reads only the folders you choose. Complete the initial download, then search offline without uploading your file contents or searches. No extra account is needed.

💻 Optional code search

Choose code folders separately and describe what you need the code to do. Code search stays separate from everyday file searches, so it will not clutter your photo and document results.

🌿 Smoother searching and typing

• Search and preview more smoothly while files are being prepared, with clearer progress updates.
• Improved Chinese and Japanese typing in both the main window and Quick Search, with fewer interruptions while choosing characters.
• Fixed the global shortcut occasionally opening Settings instead of the search window.

Before you start: AI Search requires an Apple silicon Mac; regular filename search still supports Intel Macs. Preparing your selected folders for the first time can take a while. Click ✦ AI beside the search field or press ⇧⌘I. See Local AI Search for a guide.

3.1.0 — A clearer, easier search window

🪟 See where each file lives

The refreshed results show each file’s folder directly beneath its name. Consistent rows and shorter dates make the list easier to scan and help you tell identically named files apart.

📂 Select a file and act right away

The selected result shows Show in Finder and Copy Path buttons. Common actions are right where you need them, and all your familiar keyboard shortcuts still work.

🎯 Filters and sorting, together

All filters appear as consistent labels, with sorting and match options in one menu. Whether you click a filter or type a condition, it is easy to see exactly what you are searching.

📄 One less step for content search

Turn on Content without a folder selected, and AnySearch will ask you to choose one right away—no need to visit another setting first.

3.0.0

3.0.0 includes everything introduced in 2.5.0—including File Landscape—and makes searching, finding content and everyday file actions easier.

✨ Natural-language search

Use an everyday request such as “find invoices from last week larger than 1 MB” to set file-type, date and size filters. Version 3.2.0 adds Local AI Search for finding files by their contents.

🎯 Best Match ranking

Results are now ranked by relevance instead of alphabetically: exact names first, then names starting with your term, then word matches. Recently modified files and files you've opened through AnySearch rank higher; files buried in node_modules, .git or caches rank lower. Click the Name header to switch to alphabetical order.

🀄 Pinyin search

Find Chinese file names by pinyin or initials: baogao or bg finds "报告.docx". See Search Syntax.

✨ More powerful syntax

a OR b, a|b, -exclude, "literal text", ext:pdf,docx, kind:image, in:~/Documents, and flexible dates like modified:7d, modified:2024-05 or created:last-month. If nothing matches, AnySearch falls back to typo-tolerant matching.

⌨️ Keyboard & drag-and-drop

Arrow keys, Return, ⌘Return, Space, ⌘C, ⌥⌘C and ⌘⌫ in the main window; ⌘1–9 in Quick Search. Drag results into any app, or drop a folder onto the window to search inside it. Filter syntax autocompletes as you type — press Tab to accept. Real Finder icons, highlighted matches, and all results with infinite scrolling and a total count.

🕘 Search history

Recent searches appear as chips when the search box is empty, and files you recently opened lead the recent list. Turn it off or clear it under Settings → General → History.

📄 Content search reads more formats

Plain text, CSV, JSON, RTF, HTML and source code files are now searchable by content.

🐞 Fixes

• ext:pdf now also finds upper-case extensions like "SCAN.PDF" (and those files are content-indexed).
• modified:this-week works as documented; created: is now supported.
• Content search results show the correct modification date, and the date filter works with content search.
• Removing a filter tag with ✕ now removes it from the query.
• Toolbar date presets like "Today" stay correct after midnight.

2.5.0 — File Landscape

🗺 File Landscape

See your whole Mac at a glance — no rescan required. File Landscape builds a dashboard from the existing index with file and folder counts, storage by type and extension, top folders, largest files, activity, possible duplicates, and per-disk views.

Click any row to jump into main search with that scope applied. Open it from the toolbar, Window → File Landscape, or ⌘⇧L. Full guide: File Landscape.

2.3.0

🗂️ Toggle the recent files list

The home screen shows your 20 most recent files when the search bar is empty. You can now turn this off under Settings → General → Results → Show recent files for a clean, empty start. It's on by default, so existing behaviour is unchanged.

💡 Clearer content-search help

The help icon next to the Content toggle now opens an explanation on click, instead of relying on a hover tooltip that was easy to miss.

2.2.0

📁 Search a folder straight from Finder

Right-click any folder in Finder, choose Services → Search in AnySearch, and the search is instantly scoped to that folder. It works even for folders outside your regular index — AnySearch indexes them on demand, independently of (and without slowing) the main background index. Keep your index focused on a few folders and reach the rest only when you need to. See Search from Finder.

🎯 Accurate folder scoping

When a search is limited to a folder, results now stay strictly within that folder and its subfolders. Sibling folders that share a name prefix are correctly excluded — scoping to Documents no longer leaks results from Documents2.

2.1.0

AnySearch 2.1.0 ships a round of search-power, stability, and localization improvements. Here's what changed.

🔍 Filename wildcards in the search bar

The search bar now accepts * and ? for shell-style glob matching against the full filename:

• * matches any run of characters (including none)
• ? matches exactly one character

Wildcards combine with the other inline filters, e.g. *report.pdf modified:this-week finds files ending in "report.pdf" modified this week.

☁️ iCloud Drive files are now indexed

AnySearch previously skipped ~/Library/Mobile Documents/com~apple~CloudDocs entirely. Indexing iCloud Drive is now on by default and can be turned off under Settings → Index → Index iCloud Drive.

🀄️ Chinese IME compatibility fix

In the Quick Search panel (⌥⇧Space), pressing space to commit a Chinese pinyin candidate no longer triggers QuickLook. IME composition now works as expected.

📂 Custom Quick Scopes

The Folder dropdown's preset entries are no longer hard-coded. Manage your own list under Settings → Index → Quick Scopes — Desktop / Documents / Downloads come pre-seeded so existing behaviour is preserved.

🛠️ Excluded Names settings now persist

Edits in Settings → Index → Excluded Names now save immediately and survive across launches; the previous version silently dropped them.

🎨 Toolbar refinements

• The two filter dropdowns are now clearly labelled Folder and Disk, with hover tooltips
• The Disk dropdown hides automatically when no external drives are connected
• Added a help tooltip on the Content search toggle explaining that a Folder must be selected first

🌏 Completed Chinese localization

About 80 previously untranslated strings — search modes, date presets, the subscription tab, External Disks, and more — are now fully localized so the Chinese UI stays consistent throughout.

📥 Update

AnySearch 2.1.0 will roll out via Mac App Store auto-update. You can also check manually in the App Store app.