How to Find a File on Mac When You Don't Know the Name
Arun Gopidas
You saved it. You're sure of it. Somewhere on this Mac — or maybe that external drive — is the file you need. But you have no idea what you named it. "Final" or "final_v2" or "final_ACTUAL" or something with a client name and a date. Spotlight is useless. You're staring at a Finder search bar with nothing to type.
This happens to designers constantly. Filenames are arbitrary. What you remember about a file is what it contained or what it looked like — not what you called it at 6pm on a Thursday six months ago.
Here are three ways to find any file on Mac without knowing its name.
Why Filename-Based Search Always Fails Here
Spotlight, Finder search, Alfred, Raycast — they all work the same way. You type a name, they find files that match. If you don't know the name, you're stuck. They have no mechanism for "find files related to this concept" or "find files that look like this image."
The problem isn't the tools being bad at their job. It's that their job is the wrong job for this situation.
What you need is content search, visual search, or reverse file search. These start from what you do remember about the file, not what you called it.
Method 1: Search by What's Inside the File (Content Search)
If you remember anything about what the file contained — a client name, a project title, a phrase, a product name — you can search by that.
reverscan indexes the content of your files as it scans them. PDFs get full text extraction. Sketch files give up every text layer. AI files are read as PDFs and fully parsed. IDML files yield the full text of every story frame. After a Deep Scan, PSDs, InDesign files, Affinity files, and XD files all become searchable too.
So if you remember the file had "Thornbury" or "Q3 rebrand" somewhere in it, type that into reverscan's search bar. It doesn't care what the file was called — it finds matches based on what's inside.
[SCREENSHOT: reverscan text search showing keyword typed in search bar, results showing files that contain that keyword in their content]
This works best for: PDFs, AI files, Sketch files, IDML files, and any file type that has been through Deep Scan.
Method 2: Drop a Related File (Reverse File Search)
If you have any related file — an export, a screenshot, a PDF the client sent back — you can drop it into reverscan and it will find files in your library that match.
Here's what happens:
reverscan extracts text from the file you drop (full PDF text, or OCR for images)
It builds a keyword query from that content
It searches your library in ranked order — exact filename matches first, then content matches
If the original source file shares keywords with the export you're holding, reverscan will surface it.
[SCREENSHOT: reverscan drop zone with a PDF being dragged onto it]
This works best for: when you have an export or client-supplied file and need the working file behind it.
Try it free → Download reverscan — index your Mac once and find any file in seconds.
Method 3: Drop an Image and Search Visually
This is the most powerful method when the file is an image — a JPG, PNG, screenshot, or visual export — and you remember what it looked like but not what it was called.
reverscan generates a visual embedding for every image it indexes, using Apple Vision's feature extraction. When you drop an image into the visual search zone, it generates an embedding for that image too and finds your indexed images with a cosine similarity score of 0.50 or higher.
The result: a row of thumbnails showing your most visually similar indexed images — regardless of what they're called.
[SCREENSHOT: visual similarity results strip showing thumbnail images returned after dropping an image]
This works best for: screenshots, photo exports, visual mockups, any image file where you remember the look but not the name.
Putting It Together: A Decision Tree
Not sure which method to try first? Use this:
Do you remember any text that was in the file?
→ Yes: use content search (Method 1)
Do you have any related file — an export, a PDF, a screenshot?
→ Yes: use reverse file search (Method 2)
Is the file an image, and do you remember what it looked like?
→ Yes: use visual similarity search (Method 3)
None of the above?
→ Try browsing the inline folder tree in reverscan's Drives tab. Click into the drive and expand folders — you may recognise the location even if you can't remember the name.
How to Set This Up
Step 1 — Index your files
Open reverscan and click + Index Entire Computer for your home folder, or + Index Drive / Folder for an external drive or specific folder. This runs in the background and typically takes under a minute for a home folder.
Step 2 — Run Deep Scan (recommended)
For content search to work across design files like PSDs, Affinity, and InDesign, run a Deep Scan from the Drives tab. It uses Apple Vision OCR to extract text from files that don't have a readable text layer. This is a one-time step — reverscan remembers what it scanned.
Step 3 — Search
Type keywords in the Search tab for content search
Drag a related file into the drop zone for reverse file search
Drag an image into the drop zone and switch to visual search for image similarity
Frequently Asked Questions
How far back does the index go?
reverscan indexes whatever files exist on your drive at the time of scanning. If a file was saved years ago and is still on disk, it will be indexed. There's no time limit.
What if the file is on an external drive that's not plugged in?
reverscan keeps its index even when the source drive is disconnected. Search results will show files from unplugged drives with an "Unplugged" badge — so you know which drive to plug in to retrieve the file.
What file types does reverscan index?
PDF, AI, PSD, PSB, IDML, Sketch, Affinity Design/Photo/Publisher, XD, Figma, InDesign, JPG, JPEG, PNG, TXT, MD, DOCX, XLSX, RTF, and EML — 25 types in total.
I remember the folder but not the filename — can I browse?
Yes. reverscan's Drives tab has an inline folder tree. Click into any indexed drive and expand folders to browse their contents with file sizes visible.
Does this work across multiple drives?
Yes. reverscan indexes as many drives and folders as you add. Search runs across all indexed locations at once — results show which drive each file is on.
The next time you're staring at Spotlight with nothing to type, download reverscan and search by what you actually remember — the content, the look, or a related file you're already holding.