Feature Request: Show full results immediately when searching in 1Password 8

It's one of the worst UI/usability changes I've ever seen. It was reported already two years ago during the early access phase of 1PW8. Some time ago even the developer who did the usability tests that lead to these changes admitted that at least the popup window with the extra step to show all results should have been optional.

Another problem of search is that it splits search terms at specific characters like .,@ and even worse instead of searching all items containing all (split) words combined (boolean AND) it searches for every word separately (boolean OR). A behaviour that is simply wrong in most cases.

The support people here in the forums typically tell you that an internal issue/work item to change this exists in their internal tracker and the product teams evaluates a solution. In reality the product doesn't care about this and other usability issues they've introduced with 1PW8.

I concur for the reasons you mentioned. Search for a password is critical and the current process is a big step back.

Hello @DamienMcKenna! 👋

I'm sorry that you've run into trouble with the search feature in 1Password 8. You can search for all matching items by following these steps:

1. Open and unlock 1Password
2. Type in the term that you'd like to search for.
3. Click on Show all matching items or press Command-Enter on your keyboard.

This will show you a list of all items that match your search term rather than just opening the currently selected item from the search dropdown.

@viswiz

Thank you for feedback. Regarding search terms being split due to certain special characters, I see that Tommy has replied to you in the other thread that you posted in: https://1password.community/discussion/comment/692273/#Comment_692273

@swngcat

Let me know if the steps that I posted above to search for all matching items help.

In the meantime, I've passed all of your comments along to the team internally. We have a group working on further refining and improving search and they appreciate your feedback. 🙂

-Dave

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Dave,
Thank you for the response.
The approach you suggest should be the default behavior with the other behavior opt-in. Speaking as a web application developer for over twenty years I'd love to know the rationale for making the UX change in the first place, it just doesn't make sense for it to work like that.

@DamienMcKenna

The goal of 1Password 8's search dropdown is to surface the most relevant item as quickly as possible rather than just presenting a list of all items that might possibly match the search term in some way and then requiring someone to go through the list to find the right item.

Our UX research group tested various approaches for search and this method of displaying the most relevant results in a dropdown was found to work best for the majority of users.

That being said, I do understand that this interface doesn't completely work for you and your feedback has been passed along to the team. For now, as mentioned, when the right item isn't available in the search dropdown you can still click on Show all matching items (or press Command-Enter) to view the full results.

-Dave

Thanks Dave, but isn't the described behavior the express purpose of the quick access UI?

The behavior in the app is completely non-standard and unexpected on macOS, as well as on windows the last time I used it.

+1 for at least an option to have search follow standard macOS ux practices.

@alexius

1Password 8 provides a similar search experience in both Quick Access and in the main app itself so that folks can expect to see the same "most relevant" instant results in both places. The main app, where there is room to display more items, further provides the option to display full results with Show all matching items as mentioned above.

+1 for at least an option to have search follow standard macOS ux practices.

I've filed a feature request on your behalf with our product team to have them further look into adding an option to default to the full results list. Thank you for the feedback.

-Dave

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@1P_Dave I'm using 1PW almost from its beginning on and following the forums since 1PW3. I've seen complaints about the sidebar's influence on search results but I've never ever seen complaints about the search UI.
Every single application I use on macOS, Windows and iOS uses exactly the same pattern 1PW used up to version 7, i. e. show all results and don't filter results unless explicitly requested.
Starting with version 8 the complaints about search started to appear in the forums. Even the person in charge of your usability tests (@1P_Travis - https://1password.community/discussion/comment/692075) admitted that the change should have been optional.
If the majority of your usability test users preferred the current dropdown solution then this group was perhaps not a representative one.
Looking at the releasenotes I found many internal/backend bug fixing, changed wording and shifting icons around but no fix for the many usability problems 1PW8 introduced with the current search being the worst of all.

@viswiz

Thank you again for the feedback. As mentioned, the team is continually working on iterating and improving the search experience in 1Password and your suggestions have been passed along internally.

-Dave

I just want to add that it's considerably slower to use the current default approach in the common case that you have multiple logins for a single site, as is often the case for accounts that you use at work and at home; a use-case popularized by comingling multiple vaults.

1. You accidentally click the one account, when you meant to click the other one, and now you have to type in the search terms over again.
2. You do not adequately label the accounts and you have no easy way of differentiating between them. This isn't necessarily "user error" because you may not have control over how your team chose to label a shared item.

It sounds from this thread that many of us would prefer the ability to simply choose how search behaves from the Settings pane.