mail search completely broken in Catalina

I'm having the same issue.

I tried rebuilding each mailbox, removing the Envelope Index files (in ~/Library/Mail/MailData), reindexing the volume with Spotlight, erasing the entire Mail folder, and finally disabling/enabling Spotlight.

Nothing worked.

Mail search is still dead in the water, and smart mailboxes and the "Flagged" folder are not responding.

Spotlight doesn't display any Mail results either.

The full reindexing with Spotlight took only a few minutes (it's a brand new laptop with not too many files). I assume this is normal, but is there a delay before it takes effect?

Thanks in advance

2 days have passed and nothing has changed

Tried with rebuild of mailbox and nothing happens.

Tried also with start / stop of spotlight but...no effect

Any other suggestion?

Does Apple is supposed to fix this problem?

Yes, it seems I had called victory a bit too soon. The Gmail trick only worked for a while, and then the issue popped again.

I applied the fix you describe, and once again for an instant I thought it solved it, but after a reboot, the problem came back.

Is there a reason why the attribute is reassigned to the folder? Can it be prevented?

Saw this in the log:

And xattr fails miserably for me:

MacBook-Pro-2:Library xxxxx$ sudo xattr -rd com.apple.quarantine /Users/xxxxx/Library/Mail

Traceback (most recent call last):

File "/usr/bin/xattr", line 13, in <module>

load_entry_point('xattr==0.6.4', 'console_scripts', 'xattr')()

File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/Extras/lib/python/xattr/tool.py", line 258, in main

doSinglePathChange(filename,attr_name,attr_value,read,write,delete,recursive)

File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/Extras/lib/python/xattr/tool.py", line 183, in doSinglePathChange

listdir = os.listdir(filename)

OSError: [Errno 1] Operation not permitted: '/Users/xxxxx/Library/Mail'

I tried to turn off and on, to reboot indexing via terminal, deactivate account. None of that worked.

Please help us how can we can fix the problem of searching in the mailbox.

I don't use gmail. I am using IMAP server mail. My mails are in the inbox however I am not able to search.

When are you going to support this treat Apple? Clearly there is lot of users that are raging!!!

Mine started working again after the last update (15.1), but now stopped again. I give up. Can anyone suggest the best alternative to Apple Mail for anyone running multiple gmail IMAP accounts, as it was never that good in the first place, but this renders it utterly useless.

This worked! I have spent hours on this one and finally googled asking the correct question and SUCCESS I found your post! I can get my life back as I use the search function all the time!!! Thank you!

Since I am apparently the only one this doesn't work for, I am assuming this is an issue that will never be fixed for me, much like another issue I have been dealing with since 2012 through multiple iterations of MacOS.

Same problem here - on my iMac mail search is broken, rebuilding without success - on my macbook pro it works flawlessly

I only have Catalina installed.

Same problem here.. no matter what search term is entered 5172 results are indicated below the search box but nothing updates or changes... Apple please fix

It seemed to correct itself after about 24 hours in my case!

Same here, corrected itself overnight!!😀

Same for me: nearly two days and still unable to use Mail fully.

Hopefully a fix comes very soon.

Hi,

Has anyone found a solution to this problem as its driving me mad?!