everything-search

Everything File Search

The everything_* MCP tools query voidtools Everything's real-time NTFS index. A search over millions of files returns in milliseconds, so prefer these tools over shell commands (dir /s, Get-ChildItem -Recurse, glob) for ANY filename-based lookup outside the current project directory.

Picking the right tool

Task	Tool
Find files/folders by name, extension, size, date	everything_search
"What changed in the last hour/day/week?"	everything_find_recent
All videos / documents / code / archives somewhere	everything_search_by_type
Metadata or first N lines of specific files	everything_file_details
"How many?" / "How much disk space?"	everything_count_stats

Use everything_count_stats BEFORE listing when a query might match thousands of files - check the scope first, then narrow.

Query syntax essentials

Space between terms = AND. Key operators:

report.pdf                    name contains "report.pdf"
*.py                          extension wildcard
ext:py;js;ts                  multiple extensions
path:C:\Projects ext:py       restrict to a directory tree
size:>10mb  size:1kb..1mb     size filters
dm:today  dm:last1week        modified date
dc:2024                       created date
"exact name.txt"              phrase with spaces (quote it)
a | b                         OR
!node_modules                 exclude
folder:                       folders only
file:                         files only
dupe:                         duplicate names
empty:                        empty folders
regex:^test_.*\.py$           regex (or pass match_regex=true)

Patterns that work well

• Locate a project someone mentioned: everything_search(query="folder: myproject")
• Find a config file of unknown location: everything_search(query="wg0.conf | wireguard ext:conf")
• Recently downloaded file: everything_find_recent(period="1hour", path="C:\\Users\\<user>\\Downloads")
• Disk usage of build artifacts: everything_count_stats(query="path:C:\\Projects node_modules folder:", include_size=true)
• Then inspect what you found: everything_file_details(paths=[...], preview_lines=30)

Pitfalls

• Paths with spaces must be quoted INSIDE the query: path:"C:\My Documents".
• Results reflect the index, not content: content: search only works if the user enabled content indexing in Everything (rare) - to search inside files, find candidates by name first, then read them.
• Everything must be running; if tools return connection errors, tell the user to start Everything (system tray). Do not suggest setting EVERYTHING_INSTANCE unless they configured a named instance.
• Search is across ALL indexed drives by default - add path: to scope, and prefer max_results/offset paging over huge listings.