Search Notes.app with Alfred

Search titles or create a new note if none was found

Search note titles and bodies

Search folder names

Result actions

• enter to open the note/folder or create a new note if none was found
• shift+enter to search for your Alfred query using the Notes in-app search
• cmd+enter to copy the note body to the clipboard
• alt+enter to copy a note URL to the clipboard (see the section on note linking)

Install

If you're on macOS Catalina with Alfred 4, download the latest version of the workflow.

Required setup

1. Try searching for a note
2. When an error message appears, make sure to click "Cancel" in the first dialog, then click "Open System Preferences" in the second dialog
3. Near the bottom of the pane click the "Open Anyway" button for the "search_notes" binary

This workflow currently doesn't support notes stored with Google or other internet accounts. Please make sure either iCloud or On My Mac is selected as the default account in the preferences of Notes.app.

Customize search behavior

Result ordering and title+folder search behavior can be controlled using the environment variables.

Note linking

You can generate links to any of your notes and use them on macOS or iOS.

• macOS
  • Copy note URL by pressing alt+enter on an Alfred result
  • Open note URL with "Open Notes URL.app" (included with this workflow) which works automatically when clicking a link
• iOS (must open these links on iOS to install)
  • Copy note URL shortcut (see image below for usage instructions)
  • Open note URL shortcut works automatically when clicking a link

Updates

By default, the workflow checks Github for updates every 24 hours. This can be disabled by removing the connections to the "Check for updates" block in the workflow.

Compile

If you want to compile the binary yourself, you can go into the "search" folder and do make.

Contributors

Big thanks to...

• All who have submitted pull requests
• drgrib for allowing me to build off the alfred-bear workflow
• threeplanetssoftware for the apple_cloud_notes_parser from which I copied the protobuf handling
• lslz627 for help with protobuf and tables
• Artem Chistyakov for a much improved way to create links to notes

Donate

If you enjoy using this workflow, consider donating!