Command line and power tools

Combining search terms

Updated 2026-07-31 · 4 min read

Most real searches are two conditions, and each tool expresses that differently.

Finder

Multiple criteria rows are combined with All (AND) by default. Change the dropdown at the top to Any for OR, or None for NOT.

Hold Option and the + becomes …, adding a nested group. That gives real boolean logic — (A or B) and not C — through the interface.

Spotlight

Spotlight's menu bar search accepts limited operators:

kind:pdf invoice
date:today report

It has no reliable OR. For anything complex, use Finder.

mdfind

mdfind "kMDItemFSName == '*.pdf'c && kMDItemFSSize > 10485760"
mdfind "kMDItemDisplayName == '*invoice*'c || kMDItemDisplayName == '*receipt*'c"

&&, || and ! all work. The trailing c makes a comparison case-insensitive.

find

find ~ \( -iname "*.pdf" -o -iname "*.doc" \) -size +1M
find ~ -iname "*.log" ! -path "*/Library/*"

-o is OR, ! is NOT, and parentheses need escaping in the shell.

A query language

Where a tool supports it, the same logic is one line:

invoice | receipt ext:pdf dm:<30d

That is "invoices or receipts, PDF only, last thirty days" — which is a genuinely common question, and considerably faster to type than to click.

Common questions

Can Spotlight do OR searches?

Not reliably from the menu bar. Finder's Any/All/None dropdown or mdfind's || are the workable routes.

How do I exclude a folder from a find search?

! -path "*/FolderName/*", or -prune for better performance.