Advanced Search

NotePlan allows you to search for notes or for a specific line (like a task, a bullet, etc.) inside a note:

1. Search for for a note by title: Command Bar (CMD+J) or tap on the magnifier glass icon on iOS
2. Search and filter notes: Folder Views. Click on any folder or on "Notes" in the sidebar, then configure a filter to find specific notes.
3. Search for note content: Open "Search" in the left sidebar or CMD+Shift+F to find tasks, bullets, or any lines inside your notes.

Advanced Search Syntax

The content search (open "Search" or "Filters" in the sidebar), and the Folder View search supports the following syntax. 

Note: Boolean OR and grouping is supported from v3.18.1

• Exact matches (whole words): surround a word with quotes. Example: "sun" returns lines where sun appears as a word, not as part of sunlight.
• Exclusions: prepend a hyphen to exclude. Example: #pending -#waiting returns results with #pending that do not also contain #waiting.
• Implicit AND: a space means AND. Example: project report returns lines that contain both project and report.
• Boolean OR: use OR (uppercase) to match either side. Examples:
  • meeting OR meetup — matches if either word is present.
  • #work OR #personal — matches notes/lines containing either tag.
• Grouping with parentheses: use parentheses to control precedence and combine expressions.
  • meeting (work OR meetup) — must include "meeting" and either "work" or "meetup".
  • (urgent OR high) #todo — includes either "urgent" or "high" and the #todo tag.
  • (#work OR #personal) (review OR recap) — at least one tag group and one keyword group must match.
• Grouped negation:
  • meeting -(work meetup) — includes "meeting" but excludes lines that contain both "work" and "meetup" together.
  • (draft OR proposal) -#archived — includes either "draft" or "proposal" but excludes the #archived tag.
• Quoted phrases inside groups:
  • ("design review" OR "code review") #todo — matches either phrase plus #todo.
• Nesting: you can nest groups for complex logic.
  • (projectA (design OR testing)) OR (projectB (spec OR "kick off"))

Tips:

• Combine spaces (AND), OR, - (NOT), and parentheses to craft precise queries.
• Use uppercase OR for clarity when combining alternatives (as shown in examples).

On Mac you can additionally decide what sources NotePlan should search: Calendar Notes, Events, Reminders or only Regular Notes (disable everything). You can find a settings drop down right of the search field on Mac to configure this.

Search Operators

Use search operators in square brackets at the beginning of your search to quickly filter results. Format: [operator:value ...] search text 

Note: Supported from v3.18.1

• Source operators:
  • [source:calendar] - Calendar notes only
  • [source:notes] - Regular notes only
  • [source:events] - Events only
  • [source:reminders] - Dated reminders grouped by date
  • [source:list-reminders] - All reminders grouped by list (dated and undated)
  • [source:dated-notes] - Dated notes only
  • [source:notes,events] - Multiple sources (comma-separated)
• Task status operators:
  • [is:open] - Open tasks
  • [is:done] - Completed tasks
  • [is:scheduled] - Scheduled tasks
  • [is:canceled] or [is:cancelled] - Canceled tasks
  • [is:not-task] - Lines that are not tasks
• Checklist status operators:
  • [is:checklist] - Open checklist items
  • [is:checklist-done] - Completed checklist items
  • [is:checklist-scheduled] - Scheduled checklist items
  • [is:checklist-cancelled] - Cancelled checklist items
• Date operators:
  • [date:today] - Today's items
  • [date:yesterday] - Yesterday's items
  • [date:past] - Past items
  • [date:future] - Future items
  • [date:past-and-today] - Past items including today
  • [date:this-week] - This week
  • [date:last-week] - Last week
  • [date:next-week] - Next week
  • [date:this-month] - This month
  • [date:last-month] - Last month
  • [date:next-month] - Next month
  • [date:this-year] - This year
  • [date:last-year] - Last year
  • [date:next-year] - Next year
  • [date:30days] - Rolling 30 days
  • [date:overdue] - Overdue tasks
• Location operators:
  • [path:/Projects/Work] - Search in specific folder path
  • [heading:TODO] - Search under specific heading
  • [heading:"Project Goals"] - Use quotes for headings with spaces
• Sort operators:
  • [sort:past-to-future] - Sort chronologically
  • [sort:future-to-past] - Sort reverse chronologically
• View options:
  • [show:timeblocked] - Show timeblocked events
  • [hide:past-events] - Hide past events
• Combined operators:
  • [source:calendar is:open date:this-week] meeting - Combine multiple filters
  • [heading:"Weekly Review" is:open] tasks - Find open tasks under a specific heading with spaces
  • Search operators can be combined with advanced syntax: [source:notes is:open] (urgent OR high) -#archived

Notes:

• Search operators require spaces to separate multiple operators
• Do not use spaces after colons (e.g., use [source:calendar] not [source: calendar])
• For values with spaces (like heading names), wrap them in quotes: [heading:"My Project Name"]