DwgSearch
Full-text search across every DWG in a folder tree — text, block names and attribute values.
AutoCAD 2021–2027 · English / 日本語 / 简体中文
A folder indexed, a keyword searched — file, layout, block and content results with the match highlighted.
The problem
Finding which drawing (and where in it) a piece of text, a tag number or an attribute value appears means opening files one by one and using AutoCAD's own Find — there's no way to search a whole project at once.
How DwgSearch works
These are the tabs inside the actual app, in the order they appear — every screenshot below is a real, unedited capture of DwgSearch running.
Index a folder once, then search it instantly
Point DwgSearch at a folder — it recursively scans every DWG underneath, builds a local index, and keeps it current on later visits by only re-reading files that changed.
- 1Choose Folder… picks the root directory to index — DwgSearch scans every DWG in it and its subfolders.
- 2The first visit builds a full index; a later visit only re-indexes files whose modified time or size actually changed, reporting how many changed and how many were removed.
- 3The index summary line (file count, entry count, last verified time) stays visible so it's clear whether you're searching a fresh index or one that's just been reused unchanged.
- 4Type a keyword and press Search (or hit Enter) — results list File, Layout, Block, Kind (DBText / MText / attribute value) and the matched Content, with the search term highlighted inline.
- 5Click Attributes on a matched block instance to open every attribute tag/value already captured for it at index time — no need to reopen AutoCAD to see the rest of that block's data. Copy Attribute or Copy All puts values straight on the clipboard.
- 6Click Locate on a result with a valid handle to copy a ready-to-paste AutoCAD command that selects and zooms to that exact entity — switch to AutoCAD, paste, and press Enter.
- 7Refresh Index re-scans the current folder on demand, useful right after files have changed outside DwgSearch.
Turn a search into a spreadsheet — in BlockSync/TextSync's own format
Export the current result set to a workbook laid out the same way BlockSync and TextSync already read, so a DwgSearch export can feed straight into either tool's write-back workflow.
- 1Run a search, then click Export to Excel — enabled once there are results on screen.
- 2Block-instance results (attribute values, block references with a valid handle) are written in BlockSync's own sheet layout; DBText/MText results are written in TextSync's.
- 3Text found only inside a block's static definition (no per-instance handle) is excluded from the export and called out separately, since it can't be represented in either tool's write-back format.
- 4The finished workbook opens on request, ready to review, filter, or hand off to a colleague running BlockSync or TextSync for the actual edit.
Also included
Instant search via a prebuilt local index
Search hits a local SQLite database with an FTS5 trigram index, not the DWGs themselves — trigram tokenization means both English substrings and Chinese text are searchable without a dedicated word-segmentation library.
Incremental re-indexing, not a full rebuild
Reopening an already-indexed folder compares each file's modified time and size against what's on record — only new, changed or deleted files touch the index, so revisiting a large project is fast even when only a handful of drawings actually changed.
Finds text AutoCAD's own Find command can't reach in bulk
Indexing covers DBText and MText in model space and every layout, attribute values on block references, and static text inside block definitions themselves (including nested blocks) — reported with its block name even though it has no per-instance handle to locate.
Exports straight into BlockSync's and TextSync's own formats
A search result set doesn't just export as a generic spreadsheet — block-instance rows are written in BlockSync's sheet layout and text rows in TextSync's, so a search-and-locate session can hand off directly into either tool's edit-and-write-back workflow.
Environment & requirements
Everything that determines whether DwgSearch will run on your machine, and how it behaves once it does.
- No Microsoft Excel installation required — DwgSearch reads and writes .xlsx directly with its own engine (ClosedXML).
- The search index is stored locally under %LOCALAPPDATA%\CADXChange\DwgSearch — nothing is uploaded, and deleting it just means the next search rebuilds it.
- Windows 10/11, 64-bit only.
- Requires a licensed, full version of AutoCAD (2021–2027). AutoCAD LT is not supported — LT can't run the background automation DwgSearch depends on.
- If more than one AutoCAD version is installed, pick which one to use under Settings → AutoCAD, or leave it on "Auto (newest installed)" — if that version fails to load for any reason, it falls back to another installed version automatically.
- Built on .NET 8. If the .NET 8 Desktop Runtime isn't already on your machine, the installer prompts to fetch it from Microsoft (free, one-time, roughly 60 MB).
- Network access is used only to check your license at startup and periodically afterward. Scanning, reading and writing all happen locally through AutoCAD's own engine — no drawing content is ever uploaded.
- Interface language: English / 日本語 / 简体中文.
- Batches of many files can process several drawings in the background in parallel — tune "Max parallel AutoCAD instances" in Settings to trade speed for CPU/memory headroom.
- Every long-running action shows a progress bar with a percentage and estimated time remaining, and can be canceled mid-run.
- Settings → Diagnostics → Open Log Folder gets you straight to the host and plugin logs if something needs troubleshooting.
See also the site-wide system requirements page comparing all tools.
Scenarios
A few of the situations DwgSearch is built for — if yours isn't listed, it's probably still covered by one of the tabs above.
Finding every drawing referencing a tag number
Before
A valve or equipment tag needs tracking down across a project, and nobody remembers which of several hundred drawings actually reference it.
After
Search the tag once — every drawing, layout and block instance containing it comes back in seconds, each with a one-click Locate command to jump straight to it in AutoCAD.
Time saved
~1 hour of manual opening/searching → under a minute
Auditing a project for a discontinued part number or note
Before
A component gets discontinued or a standard note changes, and finding every drawing that still references the old value means opening files one at a time.
After
One search across the whole project folder lists every file and entity still carrying the old value, ready to hand to BlockSync or TextSync for the actual bulk edit.
Time saved
~2 hours across a project → a few minutes
Due diligence on an inherited drawing set
Before
A newly received or acquired drawing set of unknown content needs to be checked for a specific client name, project code or spec reference before reuse.
After
Point DwgSearch at the folder, search for the term, and get every hit — file, layout and content — without opening a single drawing by hand.
Time saved
Half a day of spot-checking → a few minutes