Sonoma - Folder Search Not Working - 'This Mac' Search Works

Just wanted to drop another upvote here for DonnieM51's solution - I was having the EXACT same problem - Spotlight search would work on This Mac but not inside any folders.

But this: "navigate in the Finder to MacBook Air/Macintosh HD/System/Volumes/Macintosh HD, and then view hidden files by Shift-Command-Period, ".Spotlight-v100" shows up as hidden with a white minus in red circle. I then selected that hidden file, right-clicked and "Move to Trash" and it was deleted AND now my searches in folders WORKS!"

Worked like a charm. One restart later and it looks like folder search is restored as normal.

In my case the conditions were as follows: Purchased a new M3 MBP; used Migration Assistant to move my previous system (an M1 Mac Mini) via a current Time Machine backup; after a few days I noticed folder search wasn't working on the local drive (but curiously it still worked on external drives that had been indexed by the previous Mini). Search work on This Mac, but not in local folders. Annoying.

But yes, trashing the .Spotlight-v100 file (which showed 0 bytes) and restarting did the trick.

I have just looked in my /System/Volumes, and I do have a Data folder there, but it doesn't contain the [hidden due to . prefix] .Spotlight-V100 file. So my MacBook Air M1 system seems to be similar to yours.

If I open a Finder window and search for something random that I know exists, the 2 options at the top of the window are "This Mac" and whatever I have highlighted in the left pane, such as Documents. I find random things in "This Mac", but they don't show in Documents - again similar to you.

However, I have most of my information stored in the cloud, specifically iCloud. If I look in that left column, and select the iCloud folder, then the random things are found. So they are in Documents in iCloud, not Documents on the main disk.

Do you use iCloud in this way?

I was searching for a specific file within DOWNLOADS. At first it wasn't being found in a general or a DOWNLOADS specific search. Although, I could clearly see the file.

I dutifully completed the Terminal recommendations, Spotlight rebuild a 10K and a marathon and still was having an issue. ( That was way too much work Apple! )

Then I performed a force quit on FINDER and did the searches again. This proved successful. Of my 2 machines it was only an issue on one. It would make sense that a reboot would accomplish the same after making the other changes but the FINDER reset was quickest.

Good luck all!

The "Terminal solutions" need to be entered exactly.

When they don't work it is almost always because of user error.

So please tell us exactly what command you used.

Or try exactly this:

   sudo rm -R /System/Volumes/Data/.Spotlight-V100

You will be asked for your password. Type it (there is no feedback as you type) and press enter.

DonnieM51 wrote:

...

"/System/Volumes/Data/.Spotlight-V100" which wasn't permitted when trying to remove via the Terminal command. Because I have permission and Terminal does not????

Quite possibly, as a matter of fact!

This is something that we have forgotten throughout this thread, probably because those, like me, who use Terminal frequently, have done it and forgotten it (I certainly did): Terminal needs to be granted "Full Disk Access" in order to er... have full access to stuff outside your home folder.

It could be that Terminal needs to have “Full Disk Access” in Privacy & Security Settings.

DonnieM51 wrote:

rm: /System/Volumes/Macintosh HD/.Spotlight-V100: No such file or directory

Of that is the command you ran, you typed it wrong. The space needs to be escaped with a backslash.

if it doesn’t work, you may have to startup in Recovery, Mount the Data volume if encrypted, and remove the folder from the mounted Data volume, whatever name that might be.

DonnieM51 wrote:

I have both a MacBook Air M2 and a new iMac M3 both with Sonoma 14.2.1 and it appears I have the same issue as hundreds of other Sonoma users.

Sonoma is still beta-quality. It won't stop breaking every other week until June, 2024 at the earliest. You've got to break the addiction to updates or else you'll spend your entire life waiting for the next fix.

When I try to search a folder, e.g. Documents, Photos, etc. using the search field in the upper left corner and even when I use a + sign to add more search parameters, NOTHING shows up. BUT, if I switch to "This Mac" the search works as desired. This also fails when I try to create a Smart Folder (same interface).

All of that is far too general to reach any conclusions. Apple's Spotlight search system is extremely complex and extremely fragile. You can't say something like "Documents, Photos, etc." because each of those is radically different under the hood.

Also, you said "upper left corner". Even with all of the problems that Sonoma and Spotlight cause, the #1 source of problems is 3rd party system modification software. The default position for the Spotlight search field is the upper right corner. Hopefully you just made a typo. But how do we know you aren't using some 3rd party search tool?

I've tried all the recommended Apple "fixes", e.g. rebuild the Spotlight index by blocking and then unblocking the target folders. The Terminal solutions don't work either as ".Spotlight-V100" doesn't exist or I don't have permissions or something.

Stop wasting your time with all those hacks. They'll never work. Maybe one person thought it worked in 2009 once, but he was mistaken. Like every falsehood, it gets repeated over the internet for years until millions believe it.

I recommend you step back and do some more directed tests. Use TextEdit and create some files scattered in random places on your hard drive. Include unique strings of text that is (or should be) guaranteed to work. Test with that as a way to get started. Once you are sure that is working, then you can expand to other types.

I mentioned it before, but I had to re-emphasize this. You have to stop the hacks. Each time you try a hack, you are trashing your Spotlight index. Hopefully you aren't permanently destroying it. If so, only an erase of the entire hard drive and reinstall from Recovery mode will fix it. But regardless of whether you reinstall or perform a recoverable hack, you have to wait until the Spotlight index finishes. This is going to depend on the size of your hard drive and the size and nature of any external drives. If you have slow, mechanical external drives, the reindex can take days. I recommend keeping such external drives disconnected for the duration of your tests, and maybe permanently.

I simply dragged '.Spotlight-V100' to the trash and emptied the trash. I've not restarted yet, but continue to see odd, unopenable items that look like Word work files appearing on my desktop when I'm working in MS Word. Will try restarting to see if that takes care of the problem, as I don't recall if I updated to 14.4.1 before or after I tried this.

DonnieM51 wrote:

That was the *result* of the command. I copied and pasted the command, with backslash, that Barney suggested.

That's what I thought a while after I posted that.

If I view /System/Volumes in Finder, I see my startup drive name, but it isn't a folder. Some sort of mount point.

If I list it in Terminal, I see the Data directory.

On my Intel Macs that never had Sonoma, the Data volume was named, "Macintosh HD - Data," but on my M2 MBP, it is named, "Data." I don't know if it is an Apple Silicon thing or a Sonoma thing. My M2 MBP came with Ventura (I think, definitely not Sonoma), and it always had a Data volume named "Data."

My M1 Mini came with Big Sur (I think) and it has a data volume named "Macintosh HD - Data"

It may be that it will continue to inherit the "Macintosh HD - Data" if it has one.

Anyway, try listing the /System/Volumes directory to see what the name of your Data volume is, then use that in the command.

I just tried this and it had no effect, other than adding some odd unknown Word docs. to my Desktop. I can still only see files in my search after I switch to 'This Mac'. (I'd tried a recommended Spotlight reindexing fix earlier.)

On another user platform, an app called FindAnyFile was recommended, and that seems to work fine. But I'd prefer to be able to use a simple, old fashioned Finder search!

They’ve added even more obfuscation. Try using the Macintosh HD item there.

sudo rm -R /System/Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/.Spotlight-V100

Yes Terminal needs Tull disk access! 🔝