Why does a Finder earch bring up everything

You can use the "name contains" search token. A search with no other qualifier searches everything, names, content, metadata.

If you only wish to search for file names, you can search by Filename, cmd-ctrl-shift-F. You can change the shortcut by adding a custom keyboard shortcut to Finder for "Find by Name…"

If you want other ways to match file names, click on the + button to the right of the search locations.

matches and contains work slightly differently, but I can never remember the exact difference. I think matches seeks word boundaries.

One more idea:

As you want to find a folder, you could also try to combine the search for a name with a "Kind is Folder" rule:

• Enter the name into the Search field to create a search for the part of the filename
• Then click "+" to add a new rule and set it to "Kind" is, like this:

Okay thanks. So the old boolean "search" (windows-only?) Doesn't work on Mac.

Those are boolean searches.

There aren't any wildcards unless you do a Raw Query search string.

File Metadata Query Expression Syntax

You can also enter the search tokens in the search field, e.g., name: Apple.

Once you hit return, you can add another search term like, kind: folder (return). That will find all folders with Apple in the name. I don't think there is a way to OR them in the search field.

Thank you very much. this has been driving me nuts!

To add further, if you Option-click on the + (it becomes …), you can create the equivalent of AND (all), OR (any), and NOT (none). It doesn't work for the first +, but does for the subsequent criteria lines. If you don't need the first one after creating the group, you can remove it with the – button.