One of Gmail’s most popular features is its powerful search tool. By typing some keywords into Gmail’s top search bar, users can easily see all of the emails where those keywords are mentioned. Search looks at more than just subject headings: it also scans the body of each message.
But until recently, search was not able to look inside attachment files. So, if an attached .PDF or .DOC file featured mentions of that particular keyword, users were not able to automatically find that information through a search.
Today, Gmail received an update that changes that. In order to search within attachments in Gmail, users can simply type:
has:attachment keyword
Once you’ve typed that in, Gmail will search through all of the attachments you’ve ever sent or received in order to find some mention of whatever keyword you typed in. In the past, Google’s search feature was only limited to HTML and .TXT attachments. It couldn’t see inside popular Office formats or PDF documents.

You can also refine the search even further by typing in:
has:attachment filename:PDF keyword
This would display results for all .PDF attachments that feature your keyword. This should also allow users to peek inside .ZIP files.

Will your Gmail messages start appearing in search results?

This isn’t the only change that Google has planned for Gmail. Google is currently testing out a feature that would display Gmail messages alongside relevant search results. So, if you’re searching for a keyword that you have recently received an email about, then you can see that email beside the search engine results on Google.
If that sounds like a feature you’re interested in trying, then you can actually sign up for it today by clicking here. The feature is currently in field trial mode, although it works just as you would expect.