Spotlight on your Mac

Spotlight is an easy way to find anything on your Mac Studio, such as images, documents, contacts, calendar events, and email messages. You can also use Spotlight to open apps or perform quick actions, like starting a Focus.

Search for anything. Click at the top right of the screen then start typing. You can also press the Spotlight key (F4) on your keyboard. With Live Text, Spotlight can search for text in images (available in select languages).

Tip: Press Command–Space bar to show or hide the Spotlight search field.

The Spotlight window showing search results for “horse photos.”

Open an app. Enter the app name in Spotlight, then press Return.

Perform quick actions. You can quickly do certain tasks with Spotlight, like running a shortcut, turning on Do Not Disturb, or setting an alarm. Open Spotlight, then search for the action you want to perform.

A Spotlight search showing 25 pounds converted into kilograms, short tons, ounces, grams, and milligrams.

Convert currencies, temperature, and measurements. Enter a currency—like $, €, or ¥—and an amount, then press Return to get a list of converted values. Or specify a unit of measure for measurement conversions.

Narrow your search. You can include or exclude specific folders, disks, or types of information (such as email or messages) from Spotlight searches. Click Spotlight in System Settings and go to “Search results,” then select or deselect categories you want to include or exclude from your Spotlight results.

Use Siri Suggestions. Siri Suggestions offer info from Wikipedia articles, web search results, news, sports, weather, stocks, movies, and other sources when you search with Spotlight.

If you want Spotlight to search only for items on your Mac Studio, open System Settings, click Spotlight, then deselect Siri Suggestions below “Search results.”

Learn more. See Search with Spotlight on Mac.

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