How to Find the Files You Worked On Last Tuesday on a Mac

You remember the day, not the file names: it was Tuesday, you edited a quote, saved a few photos, exported a PDF. A Mac can find those files again by their modification date, which every file carries and which the Finder, Spotlight and the Terminal all know how to read.

In the Finder, press ⌘F, set the criterion to "Last modified date is exactly", and type the date. In Folia Files, open the Timeline module: it shows the folder's month as a calendar, and clicking Tuesday lists every file changed that day.

One thing to know before you start: a file keeps only its last modification date. A report you edited on Tuesday and again on Wednesday shows up on Wednesday, whatever the method.

Find files modified on a specific date in the Finder

Search for one day

1. In a Finder window, press ⌘F.
2. In the bar under the toolbar, choose where to look: This Mac, or the name of the folder you were in.
3. A row of criteria appears below it (if it doesn't, click the + button at the right end of that bar). Click its first pop-up menu and choose Last modified date.
4. In the next menu, choose exactly, then type the date.

The window lists the files whose last change falls on that day. The same menu offers today, yesterday, this week, within last (a number of days, weeks, months or years), before and after. To cover several days, add a second row with the + button: one row after, the other before. If you only opened the file without changing it, choose Last opened date instead.

"Last Tuesday" has to become a date first, so keep a calendar at hand.

Or sort the folder by date

When you know the folder, you don't need a search: switch to list view (⌘2) and click the Date Modified column title. The newest files rise to the top and Tuesday's sit together. You can also group the folder by date, which splits it into sections such as Today, Yesterday and Previous 7 Days.

Where the Finder stops

• One date at a time. You get the files of the day you typed, never a view of which days had any activity. If Tuesday turns out to be wrong, you start again with Wednesday.
• Spotlight decides. The Finder's search is Spotlight's: a drive or a folder that Spotlight doesn't index returns nothing, even when your files are there (why, and how to search it anyway).
• A sorted list stays in its folder. Files saved that day in subfolders don't line up with the others unless you search.

Use the Terminal for an exact day

The find command reads the disk itself, without Spotlight, so it works on any drive, indexed or not:

find ~/Documents -type f -newermt 2026-10-27 ! -newermt 2026-10-28

It lists the files of Documents and its subfolders modified on 27 October 2026, from midnight to midnight, local time. Change the folder and the two dates (the second one is the day after). The first time, macOS may ask you to let Terminal access the folder. On a big folder it takes a while, since every file is checked.

See your days as a calendar in Folia Files

Folia Files, a file manager for Mac, has a Timeline module that takes the question the other way round: instead of guessing a date, you see which days have files and click one.

Open the Timeline

1. Show the right sidebar: View › Show Right Sidebar (⌥⌘E).
2. Click the Modules button above it and tick Timeline.

To see it large, drag the New Pane button of the toolbar to the right edge of the window and pick Timeline in the grid that appears. View › New Pane on the Right… (⌥⌘\) shows the same grid without dragging. The Timeline is one of the modules you can keep beside your folders.

Read the calendar

The module follows the active pane: it reads the folder shown there and, by default, all of its subfolders. Each day of the month is tinted by the number of files modified that day (the deeper the color, the more files) and today is outlined. A line under the calendar sums it up: how many files, from which day to which.

• The arrows next to the month's name jump to the previous or next month that has files, skipping the empty ones.
• The small menu beside the month's name lists those months with their number of files.
• Hover a day to see how many files it holds.

List the files of a day

Click a day: its files appear under the calendar, the most recent first, each with its time, its size and, when it lies in a subfolder, that subfolder's path. Then:

• ⇧-click another day to list a range, Monday to Friday for instance;
• click the month's name to list the whole month;
• double-click a file to open it, press Space for Quick Look, or drag it to another folder or app;
• right-click for Show in Enclosing Folder or Select in Pane.

From the keyboard, the arrow keys move from day to day, ↩ lists the day, and Page Up / Page Down go to the months with files.

The day you chose stays chosen when you move to another folder, as long as that folder has files that day. Click Tuesday in Documents, then go to Downloads and to the Desktop: each one shows its own Tuesday.

Choose which date counts

The gear button in the module's header holds its options:

• Include Subfolders, on by default;
• Date Modified (the default), Date Created, Date Added, which is when the file arrived in the folder and suits a Downloads folder well, or Date Taken, which puts photos and videos on the day they were shot;
• Folders Too, to count folders as well as files.

What it reads

The Timeline only reads dates. It opens no file, so a document left in iCloud Drive isn't downloaded. It stays on the disk you are on, skips hidden folders and the inside of packages (an app, a Photos library), and stops after 20,000 folders or 200,000 items, which it says under the calendar. On a server, it reads the folder itself but not its subfolders. It never changes anything.

Mix a date with a name or a word

When you remember something else, part of the name or a word inside the document, use a search with a date criterion:

1. Click the magnifying glass (Find) in the toolbar, or press ⇧⌘F (New Search). The Search module opens at the top of the tab.
2. Type part of the name. To look for words inside documents, switch the In the name button to In the text content.
3. Click Criteria: it adds Date Modified within the last 7 days. Change the number of days, or choose today, this week, after or before.
4. Sort the results by their Modified column. Save… keeps the search under Searches in the sidebar.

That Searches section already holds Today and This Week: on a Friday, This Week still includes Tuesday's files. The search page explains the rest. And if what you remember is opening a file rather than changing it, the Recents module lists the files and folders you used lately.

Which method to use

• You know the date and the files are on an indexed disk: the Finder, with "Last modified date is exactly".
• Any drive, an exact day, no Spotlight: find in the Terminal.
• You aren't sure of the day, or you want to see the whole week at a glance: the Timeline in Folia Files.
• You remember a word or part of a name: a search with a date criterion.