How to exclude Mail messages from Finder search

findermail.appspotlight

I want to exclude Mail messages from showing up in Finder search.

->FINDER, NOT SPOTLIGHT<-

I have asked this question on other platforms, and I have found the emphasis is very necessary. Yes, you can exclude Mail from Spotlight by going to the Spotlight preference pane and unchecking Mail. This has no effect on Finder, at least in Mavericks (it did in Lion. I skipped Mountain Lion, but I believe it also suffers from this problem.)

You can also narrow what IS returned in Finder search, by clicking the plus sign and adding filters. But this is not a solution either: you can only filter what "is" returned, there is no "is not" option.

For bonus points, answers about how to exclude folders would also be wonderful. If you have ebooks, you know that they too turn up in pretty much every search. Put simpler, I just want the Spotlight preferences to apply to Finder…like they used to.

Best Answer

It is inconvenient, but if you add -kind:mail after your search term in the Finder, it will exclude Mail messages too.