Why doesn't Spotlight index .odt files?

This might help, from the search field in a Finder window, enter : kind:odt

Select Kinds : Open Document Text

Finder should create a smart folder for your seach criteria :

You can do the same by entering : kind:p

Select Kinds : Portable Network Graphics Image

Finder should create a smart folder for your seach criteria :

This should also work for .odp & .ods files :

LibreOffice comes with a Spotlight importer in its bundle. You can confirm this with the following terminal command:

/usr/bin/mdimport -L

, which lists available importers and included in this list should be:

"/Applications/LibreOffice.app/Contents/Library/Spotlight/OOoSpotlightImporter. mdimporter"

If this seems okay you can re-index your files by following these instructions:

https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT201716

Once re-indexing is complete, try typing a phrase from one of your '.odt' documents to see if it's found. Use Console.app to search for error messages from 'OOoSpotlightImporter'. I've never had any trouble with the importer myself, but cross-platform applications such as LibreOffice don't always have the resources to devote to such Mac-specific niceties.

C.

Whether in the Finder search window, or Spotlight, the following will find all Open Document format files including .odt, .ods, .odg, etc. These document types are automatically indexed by Spotlight, and I have never run auxiliary software to assist in the indexing. I do have every category checked in the Spotlight Preferences pane.

kind:opendocument