Find any file.
Before you finish typing.
Sift is instant file search for Windows, written in Rust. It reads the drive's master file table directly, indexes millions of files in seconds, and keeps itself current — results appear as you type.
Free · Windows 64-bit · ~11 MB · no telemetry · checksum & details
SiftSearch that keeps up with your disk.
One quick, native window over every file you have — no installer, no background service, no telemetry.
Live index
After the first scan, Sift follows the NTFS change journal: files you create, rename, delete, or recycle show up in (or drop out of) results within a second. No rescans, no background service — the status bar simply reads live.
Indexed in seconds
No folder walking. Sift reads the NTFS master file table in one pass — about a million files every few seconds — and searches entirely in memory after that.
Multi-term search
Type report 2025 xlsx and every term must match. Case-insensitive, across all fixed drives at once, closest matches first.
Open, reveal, copy
Double-click or Enter opens the file. Right-click to reveal it in Explorer or copy the full path.
Keyboard-first
The search box is focused the moment the window opens. Arrows move the selection, Enter opens — you never need the mouse.
Native & light
One ~11 MB Rust binary. No runtime to install, no indexing service left running, nothing phoning home.
Why it's instant
Sift never walks your folders. NTFS already keeps a catalog of every file on the volume — the master file table — and a running log of every change. Sift reads both directly.
One pass over the MFT
Every file record on the volume, streamed in a single kernel loop: names and parent links only, which is why it takes seconds, not minutes.
A small in-memory graph
Each keystroke is a parallel scan over that graph across all CPU cores. Full paths are rebuilt on demand by walking parent links.
Follow the change journal
Creates, renames, and deletes stream in from the NTFS USN journal, so the index stays current without ever scanning again.
// no directory walking — stream the volume's // own catalog of every file, in one loop loop { DeviceIoControl(vol, FSCTL_ENUM_USN_DATA, …); for rec in records(&buf) { // USN_RECORD_V2 index.push(rec.name, rec.parent); } }
Get Sift for Windows
Windows 10 / 11 · 64-bit · v0.2.0 · ~11 MB · free
SHA-256 0c6fb043cded1af1da96c6245b37fa3e37c814a988003d123b8ad239636c2170
Sift asks for administrator rights on launch — reading the master file table directly is what makes it instant. Unsigned build: Windows may show “Windows protected your PC.” Click More info → Run anyway.