Narrow your search with operators

You can find exactly what you’re looking for with Google Cloud Search by using symbols and special words called search operators. Search operators deliver more relevant results by matching certain attributes in your query. For example, you can search based on the content owner or last modified date. 

For non-Google Workspace data sources, your organization can set up custom search operators. To learn more, contact your administrator.

Use operators in your search

For example, to find content created by a particular team member, after a certain date, use the owner: and after: operators in your search query. For more details and other examples, see the lists of operators below.

1. Sign in to Cloud Search at cloudsearch.google.com.

   If you can't sign in, your account doesn't have Cloud Search. Learn more
2. In the search box, enter your search terms, leaving a space at the end.
3. Add the operator and its value after your search terms. Don't put any spaces between the operator and its value.

List of search operators

Symbols and standard operators

Use all capital letters for standard operators or they're treated as search terms instead of operators.

Operator	Description
“ “ (quotes)	Find content that includes the exact words in the same order as what's inside the quotes. Letter case is ignored. Example query: “market analysis"
- (minus)	Find content that does not include the specific word or operator term. Note: Use this operator with a search term or another operator, it doesn’t work alone. Example queries: payroll -reports inventory -owner:me sales contenttype:doc -owner:me
AND	By default, only pages that include all of your search terms are returned. You don’t need to include AND between the terms. Example query: sales reports sales AND reports
OR	Find content that includes at least one of the words or operator terms. Example queries: sales OR marketing sales from:(marysmith OR johndoe)

Cloud Search operators

• Use lowercase for operator names.
• When entering more than one value for the same operator, group them together in parentheses; for example, from:(username1 OR username2).
• For non-Google Workspace data sources, your organization can set up custom search operators. To learn more, contact your administrator.

Operator	Description
source:	Find content from a particular source. For Google Workspace sources, values are Mail, Drive, Sites, Groups, or Calendar. For non-Google Workspace sources, contact your administrator for the custom values set up by your organization. Example query: training source:mail
contenttype:	Find Google Drive or Groups content or attachments; for example, spreadsheet, presentation, PDF, image, video, drawing, folder. Available for Google Workspace content. Example query: training contenttype:doc
site:	Find Google Sites content. Available for Google Workspace content. Example query: training site:drive.google.com
owner:	Find content you own or content that’s owned by a particular person and shared with you. Example queries: reports owner:me reports owner:marysmith
from:	Find emails or calendar events: From you From a particular person or group to you Find other types of content: Created by you Created by a particular person and shared with you Example queries: reports from:me source:drive reports from:(marysmith OR johndoe)
to:	Find emails or calendar events: Sent to you (sent directly to you, to a group you belong to, or to someone else and you were copied) Sent to a particular person by you or by someone who copied you Example queries: reports to:me from:marysmith reports to:golf-club-members
before:	Find content modified before a certain date, using the date format YYYY/MM/DD. Example query: orders before:2018/09/30
after:	Find content modified on or after a certain date, using the date format YYYY/MM/DD. Example queries: orders after:2018/09/20 orders after:2018/09/20 before:2018/09/30
createddatetimestampbefore:	Find content created before a certain date, using the date format YYYY/MM/DD.
createddatetimestampafter:	Find content created on or after a certain date, using the date format YYYY/MM/DD.
itemsize:	Find content with a particular size specified in bytes.
itemsizelessthan:	Find content less than a particular size specified in bytes.
itemsizegreaterthan:	Find content greater than a particular size specified in bytes.
inurl:	Find content from a particular URL. Not available for Google Workspace content. Example query: inurl:training
mimetype:	Find content based on the original MIME type. Not available for Google Workspace content. Example query: mimetype:audio/mpeg
size:	Find items larger than the given size in bytes. Example query: size:10
larger:	Find items larger than the given size in bytes, KB and MB. Synonymous with size. Example queries: larger:10 larger:10K larger:10M
smaller:	Find items smaller than the given size in bytes, KB and MB. Example queries: smaller:10 smaller:10K smaller:10M

Tip: You can also refine your results by using the search filters at the top of the results page.