Which mailbox does search_emails read?

It searches the local accounts configured in Apple Mail (Mail.app) on your Mac. For a Microsoft 365 or Outlook mailbox, use the m365_search_emails tool instead.

Are my emails sent to the cloud?

No. The search runs locally on your Mac through Mail.app. Nothing is uploaded or stored on any server, and there are no API keys involved.

Which AI assistants can use it?

Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code (GitHub Copilot), Windsurf and Zed connect via local stdio. ChatGPT, Claude.ai, Grok and Perplexity connect through the LMCP Cloud Relay connector.

Do I need to configure anything in Mail?

No special setup. Install LMCP, grant access when macOS asks, restart your AI client, and ask it to search your email in plain language.

Search Emails on Mac with AI — Apple Mail Search

search_emails lets an AI assistant search the emails sitting in Apple Mail (Mail.app) on your Mac — across your local accounts — using plain natural language. Instead of clicking through folders and typing into the Mail search box, you just ask. For example, you can type: "Search my email for the contract attachment Sarah sent me last month." The assistant runs the search against your real mailbox and hands back the matching messages, sender, date and subject — ready to read, summarize or act on.

It's part of LMCP, a free, native macOS MCP server with 150+ tools that connects AI assistants to the real Mac apps you already use. Everything runs locally. Note: search_emails targets Apple Mail's local accounts — for a Microsoft 365 / Outlook mailbox use m365_search_emails instead.

Which AI agents work?

LMCP works with both desktop AI clients and web-based AI assistants:

Desktop clients — Claude Desktop, Cursor, VS Code (GitHub Copilot), Windsurf and Zed auto-configure over a local stdio connection. No keys, no ports to manage.
Web AIs — ChatGPT, Claude.ai (web), Grok and Perplexity connect through the LMCP Cloud Relay connector, which securely bridges the web assistant to the server running on your Mac.

Automation

The real power shows when search_emails chains with other tools. The AI can search a thread, then read_email to pull the full body, create_event to put a mentioned meeting on your Calendar, create_reminder to follow up, or draft_email a reply — all in one prompt. Ask: "Find the latest email from my landlord about the lease and add a reminder to respond by Friday." and the assistant searches, reads and schedules without you touching Mail at all.

Context

Because the AI is reading your actual Apple Mail data — not a generic guess — its answers reflect what's really in your inbox: the right sender, the right date, the exact wording. It can cross-reference an email against your Contacts, Calendar and Notes to give grounded, personal answers instead of hallucinated ones. The model never has to be told who "Sarah" is; it just looks her up locally.

Productivity

Hunting for one email — the invoice, the booking confirmation, the thread from three weeks ago — is a daily time sink. With search_emails you describe what you remember and the AI finds it in seconds, then summarizes or extracts exactly the detail you need. Triaging a busy inbox, pulling every message from a client before a call, or finding all unanswered requests becomes a single sentence instead of ten minutes of scrolling.

Privacy & GDPR

Every search runs entirely on your Mac. Your emails are read locally by the Mail.app on your own machine — nothing is copied to a server, no mailbox is uploaded, and there are no API keys to leak. LMCP stores nothing in the cloud. This is privacy by architecture: your data never leaves your device. Learn more about why this makes LMCP GDPR-compliant by architecture.

Ready to search your inbox by talking to your AI? Download LMCP for free and connect it to your assistant in a couple of minutes.