REVIEW · POWER SEARCH
Verdict: HoudahSpot is worth it if you think in criteria: file type, date, author, folder, a phrase you remember. It turns Spotlight's index into a precise, saveable search tool with a free trial and a 15-day money-back guarantee. If you rarely remember those details, its power is harder to use.
18 October 2026 · By Ishtiaque Hossain · 5 minute read · reviews HoudahSpot 6.8
Looking for a file you can describe but not name? Try Shlexball. The first 30 searches are free and need no account.
macOS 15 or later. Apple silicon. 16 GB memory. On a phone? Email yourself the link.
This review is based on HoudahSpot's own pages, read on 14 October 2026. Every claim links to the page it came from. We are the makers of Shlexball, so we say plainly where HoudahSpot does better.
| Price | Free trial; single-user and family licences on the buy page; upgrades from older versions 24 USD (single) or 39 USD (family) |
| Runs on | macOS 10.14 or newer with Spotlight indexing on; Intel and Apple silicon; compatible with macOS 27 |
| What it searches | Name, text content, extension, tags, dates, size, author, image resolution and more |
| How it works | Builds on the macOS Spotlight index |
| Licence | Single-user licence covers one named user on unlimited computers |
| Best for | Professionals and power users who work with thousands of files |
HoudahSpot is an advanced file search app for macOS, made for people who have outgrown Finder and Spotlight. It finds files by name, text content, metadata (the details stored about a file, such as its author or image size), date and more.
It does not build its own index. It builds on macOS Spotlight, the index your Mac already keeps, which is why it needs Spotlight indexing to be switched on.
You can start with a few words in the Quick Search Field and press Return when you are ready, then refine the search by adding criteria: file extension, tags, date created, file size, resolution, author and more.
Criteria can be combined into groups that match any, all or none of the conditions, and text can be matched as words, prefixes or exact phrases, with * as a wildcard for partial matches.
HoudahSpot can search several folders at once and include or exclude particular subfolders, for example searching your home folder while skipping the Music folder.
Results can be shown as a list, icons or thumbnails, sorted by any of hundreds of columns, and grouped by kind, date, size or application.
The Info pane, Quick Look and Text Preview let you look inside a file before opening it. Text Preview highlights the words you searched for and can fold the text to show only the passages around each match.
Searches can be saved as templates. HoudahSpot ships with samples such as Recent Files, which finds files opened or modified in the past 7 days.
There is a free trial. A single-user licence covers one named user on unlimited computers, and a family licence covers family members in the same household for personal use. Site licences with volume pricing start at five users.
The buy page lists upgrade prices rather than the new-licence price: upgrading to HoudahSpot 6 costs 24 USD for a single user or 39 USD for a family. A HoudahSpot 6 licence covers every 6.x version, and licences bought on or after June 1, 2020 cover both version 5 and version 6.
Houdah offers a 15-day money-back guarantee on all purchases, student pricing on request, and the app is also available through Setapp. Listed USD prices do not include sales tax or VAT.
HoudahSpot shines when you remember facts about a file. Its own examples include word processing files containing invoice or estimate, image files named logo that are 512 pixels wide, and any file that mentions a particular client.
Because it searches through Spotlight, it can only find what Spotlight has indexed. One example of that dependence: Apple Mail search is no longer available since macOS Sonoma.
For power users there are regular-expression filters (a precise pattern language for text), AppleScript automation, and the option to start HoudahSpot searches from Alfred, LaunchBar or Butler.
Buy it if your days involve thousands of files and you regularly need precise lists: every PDF from one client this year, every large image in a project, everything opened in the past week.
Try it first: the free trial and the 15-day refund window make it low risk to find out whether criteria-based search suits the way you remember files.
HoudahSpot rewards you for knowing the details. Shlexball works the other way round: you describe the file in plain English, and it finds it from what you remember, searching file and folder names and the text inside files, including PDFs and Word documents.
Shlexball searches your folders directly, not only through the Spotlight index, and its language model runs on your Mac. The first 30 searches are free and need no account.
When you can't name the criteria, describe the file in plain English to Shlexball: 30 free searches.
▶ DOWNLOAD SHLEXBALLIf you search by details such as file type, date, author or folder, yes: it turns the Spotlight index into precise, saveable searches. Use the free trial to check, and note the 15-day money-back guarantee.
The buy page offers single-user, family and site licences and a free trial. Upgrades from earlier versions cost 24 USD for a single user or 39 USD for a family; check the buy page for the current new-licence price.
No. HoudahSpot builds on the macOS Spotlight index and requires Spotlight indexing to be enabled.
Yes. It is optimized for both Intel and Apple silicon Macs and is fully compatible with macOS 27.