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Jul 01, 2025

How to create and use MacOS Smart Folders - and make file management a breeze | ZDNET

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MacOS has several handy features you might not know about. One such feature is Smart Folders. You create these virtual folders (they're saved searches rather than actual folders) and configure exactly what you want to store in them, and MacOS will continuously update the folder as files are created or saved that match the criteria.

Let me explain with an example. Say, for instance, you create and save a lot of documents with different applications and want a folder that makes it easy for you to quickly access those documents.

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Instead of you having to manually save those documents in a specific location, smart folders will automatically categorize and display those files.

You can even get more specific with smart folders. Suppose you regularly create, save, or open documents containing the word Recipe. You could create a smart folder specifically for that. Open the folder and you'll see all your documents that contain Recipe. That's pretty handy.

You can create smart folders based on:

The list of attributes you can use for a Smart Folder is lengthy, which means you can be very creative and specific with your creation. Once created, the folder's contents will be continuously and automatically updated.

Let me show you how to create a new Smart Folder.

What you'll need: The only thing you'll need for this is a MacOS device. I'll demonstrate on a MacBook Pro running MacOS Ventura. That's it! Let's get smart.

Click the Finder icon in your MacOS dock to launch the Finder file manager.

With Finder open, click File > New Smart Folder.

Creating a new Smart Folder is done within Finder.

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Let's create a Smart Folder that will house files that contain the word Recipe.In the resulting window, click + (the plus sign) near the top right of the window and, from the far left drop-down, select Contents and then type Recipe in the "contains" text field. You should see results automatically appear in the Finder window.

Creating a new Smart Folder in Finder.

Once you've set the criteria, click Save, and, in the new pop-up, give the Smart Folder a name and click Save. If you leave the checkbox checked for Add To Sidebar, that Smart Folder will be easily accessible from the Finder left sidebar.

Naming and customizing your new Smart Folder.

There's now an even faster way to create a Smart Folder on MacOS. To do this, all you have to do is open Finder, run a search for something, and then click Save. You'll be prompted to give the new Smart Folder a name (same as before). Once you've done that, your smart folder is ready to be used.

Skip the hassle of manually creating a new smart folder and simply run a Finder search and click Save.

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And that's all there is to creating a MacOS Smart Folder. If you want quick access to files that fall under specific criteria that are saved across your folders, this is the best way to make that happen.

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