What are the best alternatives to Spotlight, for searching files on a Mac?

Question

OSXProductivitySearch

What are the best alternatives to Spotlight, for searching files on a Mac?

14

Options
Considered

383

User
Recs.

Jan 14, 2024

Last
Updated

10 Options Considered

Best alternatives to Spotlight, for searching files on a Mac	Price	Price (Base Program)	Price (Unlimited Functionalities)
81 Alfred	-	Free	-
-- Quicksilver	free	-	-
-- LaunchBar	FREE - $24	Free	$34
50 Find Any File	-	-	-
-- Cerebro	Free	-	-

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Recoll

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score 127 · Answer 1

Alfred

Top Pro

Full keyboard controls

You can do everything using just the keyboard. See More

Top Con

Many features require the $25 powerpack add-on

Features like custom workflows, clipboard history, 1Password integrations and others require the powerpack add-on. See More

SuccessfulBabi's Experience

Requires Spotlight - not good - it defeats the purpose of an alternative to Spotlight! Plus it's not free. See More

Specs

Price (Base Program):Free

Top Pro

Productivity booster

Helps speed up your working day one shortcut at a time. See More

Top Con

Uses spotlight database

It requires Spotlight to index folders, so you can't turn spotlight 'off'. See More

DashingAnjea's Experience

Often does not find files I use on a daily basis - sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. Same with Spotlight, which may be the basis. Quicksilver always found my files (but has other issues). See More

Top Pro

Can be extended through plugins/workflows

Customizable workflows/plugins that can be added to enhance functionality. See More

Top Pro

Powerful free version

The free version lacks the workflows, but is still surprisingly powerful. See More

Top Pro

Lightweight and smooth

Alfred is a lightweight application for OS X and runs smoothly, even on older devices. See More

Top Pro

Clipboard history

Alfred offers a clipboard with an extensive history for quick access to your copied text, images and links. See More

Top Pro

Built-in calculator

Alfred is able to handle simple mathematical commands and more extensive expressions alike. Pressing Enter copies the result to the clipboard. See More

Top Pro

Integrates with 1Password

Alfred allows getting secure and fast access to your 1Password 1Click bookmarks. See More

Top Pro

Versatile search

Quickly search for files, applications and web services from the same input. See More

Top Pro

Can create custom automated workflows

Allows the creation of automated workflows by connecting keywords, hotkeys and actions together without writing code. See More

Top Pro

Offers both a free version and a paid version available

The paid version is more customizable, but the free version is still very powerful. See More

Top Pro

Entry of everything

Top Pro

Allows theming

Alfred allows adjusting colors, fonts, sizes and more to create new themes. See More

See All

score 32 · Answer 2

Quicksilver

Top Con

Unintuitive interface

The manual does not even give explanation about simple actions like searches. See More

Top Pro

Very easy to use

DashingAnjea's Experience

Memory hog. Very versatile and fast, but slows doen your computer. Also crashes too often. See More

Top Con

Hard to use in languages other than English

Top Pro

Highly customizible

May look and have different functionality depending on user who installed and configured it. See More

Top Con

Memory hog

Very versatile and fast, but slows down your computer. See More

Top Pro

A lot more powerful than Spotlight

Top Con

Not the easiest tool to properly configure and fully use the capabilities

Top Pro

Trigger and multilevel commands support

There are customizable triggers and capability to execute multilevel commands - e.g. launch terminal app, give the location of script and supply parameters for the script with one command. See More

Top Pro

Support for plugins

A lot of different plugins for browsers, file systems, mail clients, etc. See More

See All

score 9 · Answer 3

LaunchBar

Top Pro

Lets you create custom scripts

The Action Editor assists in creating scripts with Applescript, Javascript, python, bash, etc. See More

Specs

Price (Base Program):Free

Price (Unlimited Functionalities):$34

Top Pro

Fine grained control over the search index

Include or omit types of files, services, apps, folders, index a given folder only to a certain depth, or only index a certain filetype within that folder. The configurability of the index means that I can find the things I care about (eg not random pdf content, song titles, etc) in a under 4 keystrokes 90% of the time. See More

Top Pro

Abbreviation search which allows you to find items just by typing short acronyms of their name

Fuzzy matching will do a good job of finding items in the index, and gets better as it learns from the user's choice; eg: given I type 'dw', 'Downloads' and 'Downie' might be suggested. If I select 'Downie', then in future it will appear as the first suggestion. You can also explicitly assign abbreviations to items, without having to 'train' Launchbar as described above. See More

Top Pro

Clipboard history

Top Pro

Powerful file operations and filesystem browsing

Top Pro

iTunes library browsing, searching and control

Top Pro

Access to bookmarks and history of all major browsers

See All

score 43 · Answer 4

Find Any File

Top Pro

Fastest on APFS

The fatest way to find all files (including those not indexed by Spotlight) on APFS volumes, as it's the only tool to use the faster searchfs() (Catalog Search) OS function. See More

Top Con

Too many boxes to type into

It's a lot of clicking to create your search. It should have a way of just typing what you are looking for in one box. See More

ToughYonggungChasa's Experience

It works. You can build a search rather than having to rely on what the OS or app wants to search for - e.g. older then 6 months, word file with the name Peter in the file name. The whine about clicking is from someone who has never tried to find a specific file across 6 hard drives containing 20,000 files for the last 15 years. See More

Top Pro

Can search on network file servers

For instance, Spotlight is not good at searching on NAS drives, but FAF is. See More

Phillip Denofrio's Experience

This is a great app. really handy tool, worth every penny. See More

Top Pro

Can find any file, even protected and hidden files

To find any file, even those of other users, use the "Find All" search mode, which works with "root user" permissions. See More

RobustMazu's Experience

Can find files on any drive without spotlight indexing. This means spotlight can be turned off - at least on external drives, where spotlight often seems to fail. See More

Top Pro

Faster than EasyFind

Especially on network volume searches. See More

zanno's Experience

Well, just try to find -by using the other apps - something/anything stored on NAS-systems..... NO WAY ! Of course, I didn't try all the others, but if any of them uses Spotlight-under-the-hood, there is no chance to find anything stored on NAS-devices. Period See More

See All

score 17 · Answer 5

Cerebro

Top Pro

Closest approximate to look/feel of macOS's Spotlight on Linux

Top Con

No file system search

Top Pro

Navigate file system with previews

Top Con

Lags

Sometimes it can get slow for some reason. See More

Top Pro

Measurement conversion and calculator

Top Pro

Extensible

List of plugins at https://github.com/lubien/awesome-cerebro#plugins See More

See All

score 13 · Answer 6

HoudahSpot

Top Pro

Interactively refine search

You can add criteria to reduce the number of search results. “Find by example” allows you to use drag-and-drop to find or exclude similar files. See More

Top Con

Can’t search network drives

HoudahSpot doesn’t build its own index. It relies on Spotlight so it can only search what Spotlight indexes, which does not include network drives. Update: While this is true, advanced users can enable Spotlight indexing for a network drive by using the following command in the terminal: mdutil /Volumes/name -i on See More

PoliteMars's Experience

HoudahSpot addresses all the issues I have with Spotlight as far as providing more options to narrow the search results to what I'm looking for while not sacrificing speed. Its only potential shortcoming is that it gets its speed by using the Spotlight indexes, so if a file is missing from Spotlight it's going to be missing from HoudahSpot. See More

Top Pro

Highlighted preview of your searched text WITHIN the file

For those who need to reference quite a bit, it makes it so much easier to find specific topics or subjects with 1 or 2 key-word search and be able to not only see exactly where it's saved, but to be able to preview your search highlighted from inside the file. See More

Top Pro

Deep, query based search across your Mac

Top Pro

Precision search

Combine hundreds of search criteria. Search several folders at once. See More

Top Pro

Preview support

You can launch the preview window for a selected search result within HoudahSpot by pressing the space bar, just like in the Finder. See More

Top Pro

Search by name and/or content

You can limit your search to the filename or the file content, or search both. See More

Top Pro

Customizable

Set up once with all the criteria and columns you need. See More

See All

score 28 · Answer 7

EasyFind

Top Pro

Reliable, always just works

Top Con

Crashes often

It seems to force-shut very often. See More

PerceptiveYatha's Experience

Been using this for 20 years up to HIgh Sierra (my current OS). It has never crashed even 1 time! See More

Specs

Price (Base Program):free

Price (Unlimited Functionalities):free

Top Pro

Includes all the files Spotlight won't show

Top Con

Used to work magnificently connecting AFP but no longer works with SMB

SuccessfulBabi's Experience

I've been using it for it for many years - it's free and very reliable. See More

InventiveMaui's Experience

Sometimes my Mac stops/ freeze when the app is searching some file. I am obliged to do a force shutdown. See More

HealthyToci's Experience

Shuts down while searching on Mac See More

IntellectualIkaRoa's Experience

FIND EVERYTHING See More

ProudAglibol's Experience

Does not search typescript files not even if added ts to list of files to scan and not even if choosing scan all files See More

See All

score 2 · Answer 8

Lacona

Top Pro

You can trigger IFTTT applets straight from Lacona

score 4 · Answer 9

File Content Finder

Top Pro

The only app that searches in File Contents

HumorousAbhean's Experience

This is the only app which searches in file contents. All the others only search by name. It works out of the box without indexing. I helped me a great deal with my studies. See More

10 Options Considered

My Recommendation for Alfred

My Recommendation for Alfred

Full keyboard controls

Many features require the $25 powerpack add-on

Productivity booster

Uses spotlight database

Can be extended through plugins/workflows

Powerful free version

Lightweight and smooth

Clipboard history

Built-in calculator

Integrates with 1Password

Versatile search

Can create custom automated workflows

Offers both a free version and a paid version available

Entry of everything

Allows theming

My Recommendation for Quicksilver

My Recommendation for Quicksilver

Unintuitive interface

Very easy to use

Hard to use in languages other than English

Highly customizible

Memory hog

A lot more powerful than Spotlight

Not the easiest tool to properly configure and fully use the capabilities

Trigger and multilevel commands support

Support for plugins

My Recommendation for LaunchBar

My Recommendation for LaunchBar

Lets you create custom scripts

Fine grained control over the search index

Abbreviation search which allows you to find items just by typing short acronyms of their name

Clipboard history

Powerful file operations and filesystem browsing

iTunes library browsing, searching and control

Access to bookmarks and history of all major browsers

My Recommendation for Find Any File

My Recommendation for Find Any File

Fastest on APFS

Too many boxes to type into

Can search on network file servers

Can find any file, even protected and hidden files

Faster than EasyFind

My Recommendation for Cerebro

My Recommendation for Cerebro

Closest approximate to look/feel of macOS's Spotlight on Linux

No file system search

Navigate file system with previews

Lags

Measurement conversion and calculator

Extensible

My Recommendation for HoudahSpot

My Recommendation for HoudahSpot

Interactively refine search

Can’t search network drives

Highlighted preview of your searched text WITHIN the file

Deep, query based search across your Mac

Precision search

Preview support

Search by name and/or content

Customizable

My Recommendation for EasyFind

My Recommendation for EasyFind

Reliable, always just works

Crashes often

Includes all the files Spotlight won't show

Used to work magnificently connecting AFP but no longer works with SMB

My Recommendation for Lacona

My Recommendation for Lacona

You can trigger IFTTT applets straight from Lacona

My Recommendation for Recoll

My Recommendation for Recoll

My Recommendation for File Content Finder

My Recommendation for File Content Finder

The only app that searches in File Contents

Don't see your favorite option? Add it.

My Recommendation for Everything

My Recommendation for Everything