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All you need to know to get started with Spotlight Search on your Mac.
Spotlight or Spotlight Search is an underrated feature in macOS that you cannot stop using once you discover it. It may seem like a simple search bar, but once you uncover its true potential, your Mac-using experience will change for good. Keep reading, and I will explain what Spotlight is and how to access and use it on your Mac.
Spotlight is a powerful search tool that can help you find apps, documents, and emails, among other things, on your Mac. But it doesn’t stop there. Spotlight doubles as a smart internet search engine, pulling in live sports scores, news, currency conversions, and more, all without requiring you to open a browser.
Besides, Spotlight can serve you in a few other ways, too. For example, you can use the Spotlight Search on your Mac to get definitions of words, check the weather, get a city’s local time, and perform calculations and conversions.
For unorganized users like me, Spotlight is an efficient and smart way to search on a Mac. Instead of digging through folders or scrolling endlessly, I can simply type what I’m looking for, and it will find it in seconds, hassle-free.
Accessing Spotlight Search on a Mac is easy, and there are two ways to do it.
You can access the Spotlight Search on your Mac with a simple keyboard shortcut: Command + Space. And the best part is that it works anywhere, no matter which app you’re in.
Alternatively, you can bring up Spotlight Search using the Spotlight icon in your Mac’s menu bar. Just click the Spotlight button (a magnifying glass icon) in the upper-right corner of the screen to bring it up.
If the Spotlight button is not visible in your menu bar, you need to enable it. Go to System Settings → Control Center, then under the Menu Bar Only section, find Spotlight and set it to Show in Menu Bar.
When you access Spotlight Search with either of the two methods, you will see a search bar on your screen called Spotlight Search. You can type anything you want into this bar to look it up.
Now that you know how to access it, let’s explore what you can do with Spotlight on your Mac.
Curious about what’s new in Spotlight with macOS 26 Tahoe? We’ve got you covered! Dive into our full guide to see how Spotlight now helps you do more—like run AI actions, access clipboard history, and launch shortcuts—all without leaving your flow.
Learn about all the new Spotlight features in macOS 26 and how they take productivity to the next level.
You can customize what results you want Spotlight to show on your Mac, and if you have private information in a folder, you can also hide Spotlight from accessing that specific folder. Here’s how to customize both of these settings.
Spotlight on your Mac can also show search results from third-party apps you’ve installed. These are called Spotlight Extensions. This feature allows different apps to share the data they use and their structure with Spotlight, enabling you to find in-app content more easily.
However, sometimes you may not want Spotlight to display additional information on certain apps. Good news—you can turn these extensions on or off with just a few clicks. Here’s how to do it:
Do note that disabling Spotlight Extension for an app won’t prevent Spotlight from indexing its files. It just prevents Spotlight from understanding the inner functions of the app’s data structure and metadata.
Sometimes, due to minor glitches, Spotlight may stop working for you and show no results. Below are some fixes you can try to resolve the issue.
Signing off
Spotlight is a game-changer on Macs. And, now that you know how it works and what it can help you with, you can use it to perform various operations on your Mac efficiently and improve your overall productivity.
You can also get this benefit on your iPhone. Check out our guide on how to use Spotlight Search on iPhone to learn more.
FAQs
Siri is a voice assistant that helps you find answers to basic queries and perform simple tasks using your voice. On the other hand, Spotlight is a powerful search tool that allows you to quickly find apps, files, and the like, as well as perform calculations, conversions, and more on your Mac efficiently.
Yes, Finder search can only find files on your Mac, while Spotlight can find a whole bunch of things. Not to mention, it can help you with many other tasks.
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