I built an AI-Powered semantic search for Mac

In plain words

SmartSearch is an AI-powered semantic search tool for Mac that indexes local files and finds documents using natural language queries rather than exact filename matching. It uses SentenceTransformers and FAISS to search through Documents folders and nested files, with results for PDFs, images, and other content. The application runs entirely locally on the user's computer, accessed via a keyboard shortcut, and is available as open-source software on GitHub.

written from the facts on this page · September 2026

From the sources

AI-powered semantic search for Mac. Contribute to neberej/smart-search development by creating an account on GitHub.

There are two portions - backend which does heavy lifting creating embeddings and frontend which communicates using rest APIs. ./install.sh Run ./start-frontend.sh ./start-backend.sh Build (for prod/usage) The following build process creates a .dmg file that can be installed. And then, Ctrl + Space or Cmd + Space shows/hides thefrom github.com

In the maker’s words, at launch

After getting frustrated with macOS's Spotlight search, e.g., typing "driver license" doesn't give me anything unless the file name matches exactly, I thought, why not index my entire Documents folder? This way, I can find that one PDF or image buried deep in subfolders using natural language queries. So I built…

• 
  Semantic grep with local embeddings2025 · github.com · ▲179

  Local first semantic and hybrid BM25 grep / search tool for use by AI and humans! - GitHub - BeaconBay/ck: Local first semantic and hybrid BM25 grep / search tool for use by AI and humans!

• 
  AI search for every photo and every frame of video on macOS19d ago · github.com · ▲183

  Deep AI search for every photo and every frame of video in any folder on macOS - allenv0/SCM

• OA
  OSS AI agent that indexes and searches the Epstein filesJan 2026 · epstein.trynia.ai · ▲211

  Hi HN, I built an open-source AI agent that has already indexed and can search the entire Epstein files, roughly 100M words of publicly released documents. The goal was simple: make a large, messy corpus of PDFs and text files immediately searchable in a precise way, without relying on keyword search or bloated prompts. What it does: - The full dataset is already indexed - You can ask natural language questions - Answers are grounded and include direct references to source documents - Supports both exact text lookup and semantic search Discussion around these files is often fragmented. This…

• IM
  I made a website to semantically search ArXiv papers2024 · papermatch.mitanshu.tech · ▲324

  As a grad student (and an ADHDer), I had trouble doing literature review systematically. To combat this, I made a website that finds similar papers using the meaning of the thing I am looking for. I used MixedBread's [^1] embedding model to generate vectors from the abstracts. I store and search similar vectors using Milvus [^2] and finally use Gradio [^3] to serve the frontend. I update the vector database weekly by pulling the metadata dataset from Kaggle [^4]. To speed up the search process on my free oracle instance, I binarise the embeddings and use Hamming distance as a metric. I would…

• 
  Searchable.ai2021 · ▲316

  One search across all your local, cloud and app files

• 
  PDF Search for Mac2017 · pdfsearchapp.com · ▲81

  Search multiple documents insanely fast

Questions this answers

• filebrowser

• 
  Spira Maxima▲578

  Video model that turns script into viral social media videos

  AI · 18d ago · spira.ai

• 
  Rill Browser▲540

  The browser where Claude Code and Codex work beside you

  AI · 18d ago · rill.love

• 
  Germany's new sovereign AI model Kolibri▲424

  Kolibri is Aleph Alpha

  AI · 20d ago · tej.as

• 
  Giving Opus 5.5 a simulated paint canvas▲392

  Paintings by AI models: programs run through a simulation of oil paint.

  AI · 21d ago · stillwet.art

• 
  PixVerse R2▲381

  A real-time world model you can explore and change

  AI · 30d ago · world.pixverse.video

• 
  Beam.win▲378

  Run AI agents on one Mac and use its windows on another

  AI · 4d ago · beam.win

• IM
  I'm an airline pilot – I built interactive graphs/globes of my flights▲1,539

  Hey HN! Pilots everywhere are required to keep a logbook of all their flying hours, aircraft, airports, and so on. Since I track everything digitally (some people still just use paper logbooks!), I put together some data visualizations and a few 3D globes to show my flying history. This globe is probably my favourite so far: https://jameshard.ing/pilot/globes/all If you’ve got ideas for other graphs or ways to show this kind of data, I’d love to hear them!

  Life & fun · 2025 · jameshard.ing

• 
  Chronicle: Cursor for Slides▲1,212

  Stunning presentations with AI. No design skills required.

  AI · 2025 · chroniclehq.com

• 
  Bubble for native mobile apps (beta)▲1,026

  Build native mobile apps for iOS and Android without code.

  Dev tools · 2025 · bble.io

• 
  Twenty▲989

  Build your Enterprise CRM with an AI-friendly SDK

  Dev tools · 2025 · twenty.com

• 
  Pally - AI Relationship Management▲949

  All your connections, across all your socials.

  AI · 2025 · pally.com

• 
  Workout.cool – Open-source fitness coaching platform▲827

  I was the main contributor to workout.lol, an open-source fitness app to easily build a workout routine. The project had traction (1.4k GitHub stars, 95 forks, ~20K visits/month), but was eventually sold due to video licensing hurdles. The new owner stopped maintaining it, and the repo went abandoned. Over the next 9 months, I sent 15 emails to try to save it : no replies. Feature requests & issues were ignored. The community was left with a "broken" tool let's say. I couldn't just let it die So I built the new version from scratch with the same open-source spirit, but a better…

  Dev tools · 2025 · github.com