REVIEW · POWER SEARCH
Verdict: For 6.99 USD, ProFind packs an unusual amount in: name and content search without Spotlight, OCR for scanned files, image recognition, network and cached disks, and a readable command language. It is excellent value for people who search network drives and like precise queries; read the mixed App Store reviews and use the 14-day trial before relying on it.
28 October 2026 · By Ishtiaque Hossain · 4 minute read · reviews ProFind 1.42
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macOS 15 or later. Apple silicon. 16 GB memory. On a phone? Email yourself the link.
This review is based on ProFind'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 ProFind does better.
| Price | 6.99 USD direct with a 14-day trial; Mac App Store version is free with a one-off in-app purchase |
| Runs on | Version 1.42, macOS 11 or later; some features need macOS 12 or 14 |
| What it searches | Names, dates, size, tags, kind and text inside PDF, Word and RTF files, with optional OCR |
| Without Spotlight | Yes, except for Spotlight metadata searches |
| Made by | Ross Tulloch (zeroonetwenty) |
| Best for | Searching network and external disks with precise queries |
ProFind is a Mac search app that promises fast and complete searches of any disk. You combine more than a dozen criteria, such as name, date, size, tags and file contents, either in plain English or as boolean queries with and, or, not and parentheses.
Spotlight is not required, except when you search Spotlight metadata. ProFind searches any disk type: Mac disks, Windows disks, servers and network volumes, including invisible folders and app packages.
Its query language reads naturally. The words before a colon match the name, and the commands after it refine the search: for example, budget : content "Q4 forecast" or .key OR .pptx : modified this year. Autocompletion suggests commands and keywords as you type.
ProFind searches the text inside files, including PDF, Word and RTF documents, and highlights the matches. Optional OCR (optical character recognition, which reads text in images) covers scanned and image-based files.
It also searches inside zip and tar archives, both file names and contents, a feature added in version 1.41.
Image Recognition finds photos by what is in them, using on-device machine learning on macOS 12 or later, so a query such as photos : image includes "dog,cat" works without tagging anything.
Optional disk caching stores file names, sizes and dates for faster searches, especially on network disks, and lets you search a disk even when it is disconnected. Version 1.42 brought a new caching database that builds faster and takes less space.
The free ProFind Remote app for iPhone and iPad lets you search your Mac from your phone, then preview, download and share results, over an encrypted connection on your local network.
From the results you can use Quick Look, run shell scripts, AppleScripts and Shortcuts, save searches with full history, and export results to text or CSV. A visual query editor, which needs macOS 14 or later, helps build complex queries.
ProFind costs 6.99 USD bought directly, after a free 14-day trial. The Mac App Store version is free to download and needs a one-off in-app purchase for full functionality after the trial.
It is actively developed: the App Store version history shows several releases in 2026, including 1.42 with the new caching database.
App Store reviews are mixed. Two users with Synology NAS drives praise it for searches Spotlight fails at; another reports constant crashes on a Mac Studio, and an older review says it often did not find files.
ProFind suits people with network drives and external disks who want precise, fast searches without depending on Spotlight, and who like typing queries.
At 6.99 USD it is cheap, but use the 14-day trial on your own disks first, given the mixed user reports.
ProFind's commands are clear but you still need the right words and criteria. Shlexball takes a description of what you remember and finds the file, searching names and the text inside files, including PDFs and Word documents.
Shlexball is read-only and its language model runs on your Mac. The first 30 searches are free and need no account.
No syntax to learn: describe the file to Shlexball in plain English. 30 free searches.
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No. Spotlight is only needed for Spotlight metadata searches.
Yes. It searches the text inside PDF, Word and RTF documents and highlights matches, with optional OCR for scanned files.
Yes. It searches servers and network volumes, and optional disk caching speeds up network searches and works when disks are disconnected.