search in preview not working in macos mojave

BTW, in order to get search working again, you have to close the window (command + w) and reopen on the pdf. Closing Preview all together (command + q) and reopening the pdf doesn't work. This is indeed bizarre.

I also had this problem with search in Preview under Mojave – and not being able to search a 700+ page reference book is a serious problem! Works in most PDFs but not some. I've tried every possible workaround listed here and none worked for me. (FWIW, there is no Table of Contents option for search in this version).

Here's what worked: In Preview export your document as PDF. It'll create a new PDF which, in my case, was immediately searchable. IMPORTANT: Don't trash your original PDF if there are links in it. Exporting as PDF broke all chapter and TOC links.

But at least I can search this 700 page document.

FWIW, what I found out by accident is, some PDFs have to be closed then re-opened in order for search to work. No idea why.

This has been driving me crazy for the past 30min. I tried quitting Preview, restarting, & even clearing a few caches to no avail. However, closing (via ⌘W) reopening the PDF has worked for me thus far!

I tried this on several PDFs. Opened them – couldn't search. Closed and reopened them and search worked. Rather bizarre but at least it is funcional.

My late 2012 iMac has the same problem – can not search PDFs. Always says No Results Found, even when I can see the searched for word in the doc.

But my 2014 MacBook Air works perfectly.

iMac has a Fusion drive that was converted to APFS. Not sure if that has anything to do with the problem, but it is a big change.

I am having a similar problem, the update to Mojave has rendered Preview useless. It just loads and the image never appears. I also can't open PDF's anymore. There is some sort of conflict with Adobe Acrobat I can't seem to figure out.

On the released version of macOS Mojave 10.14, I can generate a new PDF from a Pages v7.2 document, and Preview will allow me to search for single, or quoted strings — with the expected highlighted results. This is true if the PDF were generated from MacTeX, or other PDF generation source.

I have the same problem after updating a 2015 MBP to Mojave.

Bugs this problematic at such fundamental functions of built-in software are unacceptable, especially for a company that demands a premium for products that "just work".

FWIW, comm-W works (for now), but it's ridiculous to have to disrupt my workflow like that.

I deliberately didn't upgrade to Mojave until it had been around for a while, assuming most bugs would've been fixed by then. I finally took the plunge with 10.14.3 and within 24 hours I found this problem.

Nice to know it's not just me, but I'm amazed it still hasn't been fixed. This is the kind of thing you'd expect from Micro-bloody-soft, not Apple.

I thought it bizarre as well.

I have the same issue. CMD + W only works sometimes. Spoke to Apple Support today. Two different people told me they were unaware of the issue and gave no ETA on a fix.

Interesting. The workaround works 100% of the time for me with PDFs that can't be searched the first time. I haven't checked every single one of course. But I have checked a couple dozen.

Very unusual.

⌘W works for me as well. ⌘Q Does not.