Spotlight alternatives for macOS

[bogdanw]

The last thread with this title was from 2012, Spotlight is getting worse with every new macOS release, so here are some alternatives:

Alfred https://www.alfredapp.com

Cerebro app https://www.cerebroapp.com

Cling https://lowtechguys.com/cling by @alinpanaitiu

DocFetcher https://docfetcher.sourceforge.io/en/index.html

EasyFind https://www.devontechnologies.com/apps/freeware

Find Any File https://findanyfile.app

Finder https://support.apple.com/en-au/guide/mac-help/mchlp2605/mac

HoudahSpot https://www.houdah.com/houdahSpot/

LaunchBar https://www.obdev.at/products/launchbar/index.html

LeaderKey https://github.com/mikker/LeaderKey.app

Quicksilver https://qsapp.com

Raycast https://www.raycast.com

Sol https://sol.ospfranco.com

Ueli https://ueli.app

Zazu App http://zazuapp.org


As Spotlight is both a file searcher and an app launcher, alternatives are for both functions.
It’s a wiki post, please add alternatives in the same format: name of the app – official website – developer user name on the forum (if present/known).

 

[gilby101]

The are two aspects to "Spotlight":

• Spotlight the index
• Spotlight the search interface/tool, with sub aspects:
  • file searcher
  • app launcher

Some search tools use the Spotlight index (e.g. Finder, HoudahSpot and Alfred) and some do not (e.g. Find Any File and Easy Find).

Bear this in mind when discussing alternatives - it is just an alternative front end to Spotlight index, or is it also a different indexing method? There is value in both.

Spotlight is getting worse with every new macOS release

From my experience, I don't agree.

In spite of real problems that some are having, I find the Spotlight interface (Command-Space) is getting better. I now use it more than I did a few years ago when I always used Alfred or HoudahSpot as both app launcher and file searcher.

The Spotlight index is significantly more comprehensive than some years ago. As two examples: indexing image content, and key phrases.

 

[gilby101]

I have added Finder as a file searcher which uses the Spotlight index. As well as providing a relatively painless way of doing both simple and complex file searches, it has features like Smart Searches https://support.apple.com/en-au/guide/mac-help/mchlp2804/mac

The list at the top has software I have never heard of. I can see hours of discovery and experimentation are ahead of me.

 

[bogdanw]

In spite of real problems that some are having, I find the Spotlight interface (Command-Space) is getting better. I

It’s worst for my use: searching for Photoshop files by text used to return file names. Now there is an idiotic “Photos from Apps” section where I can’t tell what file is it.

 

[gilby101]

Now there is an idiotic “Photos from Apps” section where I can’t tell what file is it.

I see what you mean! But when I do a search for psd, I get images shown in the "Photos from Apps" section. Click "Show more" and that leads me to a "Search in App" which opens a Finder search with the search term "(kind:image OR kind:movie) psd".

That is sort of good, though when I want to do a wide ranging search by file type, I would go directly to Finder or HoudahSpot. I guess that finding the most appropriate tools for a task is the whole point of this thread.