Zendesk Support search reference

This article contains tables listing and describing data property keywords and values that can be used, along with common search operators, to narrow your search results. There are also sections describing more advanced search methods and formatting.

This article is aimed at administrators and support managers with full access to the data in Zendesk Support. If you're an agent, start with Searching the data in Zendesk Support and refer back to this reference article if you want to perform more advanced searches.

This article includes the following topics on advanced search methods:

• Search terms and terminology
• Searching for properties that contain no data
• Searching by date and time
• Sorting search results
• Using the 'type' keyword
• Search FAQ

This article includes the following reference tables:

• Search operators
• Ticket property keywords
• User property keywords
• Organization property keywords
• Group property keywords
• Satisfaction rating searchable values

Search terms and terminology

Zendesk Support search allows you to narrow your results by using data property keywords, operators, and search terms. In the context of an advanced search:

• Data property keywords indicate that you are restricting a search to one or more specific data properties.
• Operators are symbols used to modify the keywords and focus the search.
• Search terms are the words, phrases, or values you are searching for.

Search terms can include any string, including user, organization, or group names. For example, you can search for "top" to list all users with the tag "top" or "top tier." The results will also include other data in Zendesk Support that match the string "top" as a single word, a single word in a longer phrase, or the prefix of a longer word; however, it will not include data where the string "top" appears in the middle or end of a word.

For instance, a simple search on the string "top" would return:

• All users with tags that include the string "top"
• Users "Top Ten Trucking," "Tip-Top Mops," "Big Top Entertainment," and "Dessert Toppings, Inc."

That search would not return:

• "Desktop Solutions" or "One-Stop Publishing"

Note: It can take a few minutes for Zendesk Support to index new and modified tickets, users, and other resources. If they don't appear in your search results, wait a few minutes and try again.

The following is an example of a search string looking for anything with the tag "vip" that was created before May 1, 2015:

tags:vip created<2015-05-01

• tags is a keyword indicating you are searching only within a specific data property, in this case a tag.
• : is an operator indicating the tag property needs to match the subsequent search term. Note that there is no space before or after the :.
• vip is the search term referred to by the prior property/operator combination.
• created is a keyword indicating you are searching the created data property for items created relative to a certain date.
• < is an operator indicating you are searching for users, tickets, organizations, or articles created before a certain date.
• 2015-05-01 is a search term indicating the date you want to use.

If submitting multiple search terms, search has a default AND behavior, rather than an OR behavior. For example, searching for the following phrase returns results only if all of the words are present, in any order.

Please upgrade my account

However, when you use a data property keyword multiple times in a query, there is an OR search across the values you specified. The following phrase returns results that contain either the tag "silver" or the tag "bronze".

tags:silver tags:bronze

Searching for properties that contain no data

Properties that contain no data can be searched for using none as the search term, along with the group, tags, via, organization, or assignee keywords, as in this example:

assignee:none

This returns all unassigned tickets.

Searching by date and time

Date property keywords - created, updated, solved, and due date) can be combined with search operators to return data from a specific date, before a certain date, and after a certain date. To search dates in any locale, use the format YYYY-MM-DD. You can also use locale-specific formats such as MM/DD/YYYY in the United States.

To search for data before a certain date, use the less than (<) operator:

created<2011-05-01

To search for data after a certain date, use the greater than (>) operator:

due_date>2010-01-10

To search for a specific date, use the equals (:) operator:

solved:2010-01-10

You can also use the <= or >= operators to indicate less-than-or-equal-to and greater-than-or-equal-to respectively.

Searching with combined dates and times

You can specify a combined date and time using ISO8601 syntax:

created>2015-09-01T12:00:00-08:00
updated<2015-09-01T12:00:00Z

The first example above searches for anything created after September 1, 2015 at 12:00 p.m. (Pacific Standard Time).

The second example above searches for anything updated before September 1, 2015 at 12:00 p.m. (UTC).

Searching within a date/time range

You can search within a date range, for example August 2, 2014 through August 4, 2014, using the following search statement:

created>2014-08-01 created<2014-08-05

You can also include specifc times in your search range. The following example searches for anything created between August 1, 2014 at 11:59 p.m. (UTC) and August 2, 2014 at midnight (UTC):

created>2014-08-01T11:59:00Z created<2014-08-05T24:00:00Z

Searching with relative times

You can search for a time relative to the present time, using the time units hours, minutes, days, weeks, months, or years. The following search returns anything created in the last four hours:

created>4hours

Sorting search results

You can sort your search results by field, in ascending or descending order, using the following keyword phrases:

• order_by:field
• sort:asc or sort:desc

Sorting is available on the following fields:

• created
• commented
• priority
• status
• ticket_type

Using the order_by and sort keywords is equivalent to using the API parameters sort_by and sort_order.

Using the 'type' keyword

For API searches, one of the tools you have available for narrowing your search results is the type keyword. It is used to explicitly declare that you want to search for one of the following types:

• ticket
• user
• organization
• group
• entry or topic (forums)

Using the type keyword means that you are explicitly searching on the type you specify. For example, you can search for all the users that belong to the customer's organization using this search statement:

type:user organization:customers

If you instead searched for organization:customers you would also get all the tickets that have requesters who belong to this organization. This is because searches that do not explicitly specify type return results for all types, including tickets (and organization is a ticket property).

Using type:user, your search returns all users that belong to the Customers organization. So, you're narrowing your search to the user type and excluding tickets.

While organizations and groups are properties of the user object, they have their own properties that can be searched as well. The following query allows you search only for organization tags, excluding tags of the same name that may be used in other elements of your Zendesk Support instance such as tickets and forum topics.

type:organization tags:premium

Search FAQ

• How soon can new data be searched?

  When you add new data to Zendesk Support, it typically takes about a minute before it's indexed and can be searched.

• How does punctuation affect search?

  Punctuation characters are generally not included in searches.

• Are there limitations to wildcard searches?

  You can only do wildcard searches when combined with property keywords (subject:photo*). The wildcard must go at the end of the search term.

• Who can search what?

  Administrators can search all the data in Zendesk Support. Agents can search the data that they've been granted access to. End-users can do full text searches of the knowledge base.

• What languages are supported?

  There is language-specific support for searching in the following languages:

  • English
  • French
  • German
  • Japanese
  • Portuguese
  • Spanish

  The support includes dictionary-based tokenization for Japanese, because words are not separated by spaces in that language. For the other languages, the language-specific support is primarily stemming, which allows different forms of the same word to match. In particular, the singular and plural forms of a word will generally match.

Search operators

You can use the following search operators to build your search statements.

Table 1. Search operators

Operator	Description
:	The colon indicates that the given field should equal the specified value. status:open
<	Less than. status<closed
>	Greater than. priority>normal
<=	Less than or equal to. status<=pending
>=	Greater than or equal to. priority>=normal
" "	Double quotes. In a simple keyword search, this is referred to as a phrase search and returns the exact words in the exact order. "Please upgrade my account" In a search including data properties, use double quotes to perform an inclusive AND search, returning results that include all properties in the search. "tags:superman tags:is_awesome"
-	Minus sign. Excludes items containing a word (or property value) from the search results. For example, the following statement searches for any tickets with the status 'pending', but excludes any tickets containing the tag 'invoice' from the search results: status:pending -tags:invoice
*	The wildcard operator is useful when you want to search various forms of a word. For example, searching for photo* returns results that would include photography, photographer, photograph and any other words that began with 'photo'. However, because of the performance issues involved with doing wildcard searches, unqualified wildcard searches are not currently supported. In other words, you need to use a property keyword to make your search specific to the data you're trying to locate. subject:photo*

Ticket property keywords

You can search on the following ticket properties.

For more information about ticket search, see Searching tickets.

Table 2. Searchable ticket properties

Keyword	Description
Ticket ID	There isn't a property keyword for the ticket ID. Instead, you simply search for the ticket by its ID number in the following format: 233
created	The date, or date and time, the ticket was created. Enter date in yyy-mm-dd format. created:2011-05-01 Search within a date or time range. Enter times using ISO 8601 syntax. For example, to search for a ticket created between 10:30 a.m. and 12 p.m. (UTC) on August 1, 2014: created>2014-08-01T10:30:00Z created<2014-08-01T12:00:00Z For more information on using date and time in your search, see Searching by date and time.
updated	The date of the most recent ticket update. updated>2011-05-15 For more information on using date and time in your search, see Searching by date and time.
solved	The date the ticket was set to solved. solved<2011-06-01 For more information on using date and time in your search, see Searching by date and time.
due_date	The due date of tickets. due_date:2011-06-01 For more information on using date and time in your search, see Searching by date and time.
assignee	The assigned agent or other entity. You can specify "none", "me", user name (full name or partial), email address, user ID, or phone number. assignee:"Susan Warren"
submitter	The ticket submitter. This may be different than the requester if the ticket was submitted by an agent on behalf of the requester. You can specify "none", "me", user name (full name or partial), email address, user ID, or phone number. See Searching ticket user roles. submitter:me
requester	The ticket requester. You can specify "none", "me", user name (full name or partial), email address, user ID, or phone number. requester:[e-mail]
subject	The text in the ticket's subject. subject:"upgrade account"
description	The text in the ticket's description and comments. description:defective
status	Possible values: new, open, pending, hold, solved, closed. status<closed
ticket_type	Possible values: question, incident, problem, task. ticket_type:problem
priority	Possible values: low, normal, high, urgent. priority>low
group	The assigned agent's group name. group:"Level 2"
organization	Specify the name or ID of the ticket requester's organization or "none." organization:customers
tags	Specify tags that have been added to the ticket or "none." tags:premium To find tickets that include either of two tags, use: tags:important tags:urgent To find tickets that include both tags: tags:"important urgent"
via	The ticket's source, which can be any of the following: mail (from an email message) get_satisfaction, get_sat, "get satisfaction" (from Get Satisfaction) closed_ticket (from a followup ticket) ticket_sharing dropbox (from the Zendesk Feedback Tab) chat (from Chat) twitter_dm, "twitter dm", "twitter direct" (from a Twitter direct message) twitter_fav, twitter_favorite, "twitter favorite" (from a Twitter favorite) twitter_like, "twitter like" (from a Twitter like; alias of twitter_fav) twitter (from any Twitter method including direct message and favorite) voicemail (from a voicemail message) phone_call_inbound (from an inbound phone call) phone_call_outbound (from an outbound phone call) phone (from voicemail, CTI, or an inbound call) sms, text, "text message" (from a text message) api (from API call or integrated web service) logmein, logmein_rescue, "logmein rescue" (from LogMeIn) facebook_post, "facebook post" (from a Facebook wall post to a page) facebook_message, "facebook message" (from a Facebook private message to a page) facebook (from any Facebook method including private message and wall post) web, "web form" (from a web form) mobile_sdk (tickets created using the Zendesk mobile SDK) "any_channel" (from the channel framework) via:phone
commenter	People who have added comments to tickets. You can specify "none", "me", user name (full name or partial), email address, user ID, or phone number. commenter:"Mike"
cc	People who have been CC'd on tickets. You can specify "none", "me", user name (full name or partial), email address, user ID, or phone number. cc:[e-mail]
fieldvalue	Search for a specific value in custom ticket fields by using the fieldvalue keyword. For example: fieldvalue:12345 This returns all the tickets that have a custom field with the value "12345." For drop-down custom fields, search based on the option's field value. If you're using nested drop-down fields, search using the option's tag. For details, see Organizing drop-down list options.
brand	Search for a specific Brand on a ticket. A Brand with two or more words requires quotation marks, while a one word brand can be searched as is. For example: brand:Nordstrom Or brand: "Banana Republic"
has_attachment	Search for all tickets with or without attachments using true or false. To search for tickets with attachments: has_attachment:true To search for all tickets without attachments: has_attachment:false
form	Search for all tickets created with a particular ticket form. If the name of the ticket form includes multiple words, use quotation marks. For example: form:"default ticket form" If the name of the ticket form is a single word, you don't have to use the quotation marks. For example: form:legal
recipient	Search for all tickets created with a particular recipient. This only works for Zendesk support addresses (the ultimate destination) of emails forwarded from external addresses. recipient:[e-mail]

User property keywords

Here's the list of user properties that can be searched.

For more information about searching users, see Searching for users, groups, and organizations.

Table 3. User property keywords

Keyword	Description
name	The user's partial or full name. name:"alex anderson"
role	The user's designated role. role:admin
email	Specify the user's email address, or specify none to search for users without an email address. email:[e-mail]
group	The user's group name. This only applies to admin and agent users. group:"Level 2"
organization	Specify the user's organization name or ID, or specify none to search for users without an organization. If the user belongs to more than one organization, searching on any of those organizations will return their profile. organization:mondocam
created	The date the user was added to your Zendesk. created<2011-05-01 For more information on using date and time in your search, see Searching by date and time.
notes	All text in the notes field in the user's profile. notes:"manager"
details	All text in the details field in the user's profile. details:"madison, wi"
external_id	Specify the user's external ID, if used, or specifynone to search for users without an external ID. external_id:0098884412
phone	Specify the user's phone number, or specify none to search for users without a phone number. phone:[phone]
tags	Specify tags on the user's profile, or specify none to search for users without tags. tags:premium tags:wholesale For more information about tagging users and organizations, see Adding tags to users and organizations.
customfield	Custom user fields. plan_type:platinum For more information, see Searching custom user and organization fields.
is_verified	Search for users with or without verified email using true or false. To search for users with a verified email address: is_verified:true To search for users without a verified email address: is_verified:false
suspended	Search for users that are and aren't suspended using true or false. To search for suspended users: is_suspended:true To search for users that aren't suspended: is_suspended:false For more information, see Searching custom user and organization fields.

Organization property keywords

Here's the list of organization properties that can be searched. For more information, see Searching for users, groups, and organizations.

Table 4. Organization property keywords

Keyword	Description
name	The organization's partial or full name. name:mondocam
created	The date the organization was added. created<2011-05-01 For more information on using date and time in your search, see Searching by date and time.
notes	All text in the notes field in the user's profile. notes:EMEA
details	All text in the details field in the organization's profile. details:london
tags	Specify tags that have been added to the organization, or specify none to search for organizations without tags. tags:premium For more information about tagging users and organizations, see Adding tags to users and organizations.
customfield	Custom organization fields. plan_type:platinum For more information, see Searching custom user and organization fields.

Group property keywords

Here's the list of group properties that can be searched. For more information, see Searching for users, groups, and organizations.

Table 5. Group property keywords

Keyword	Description
name	The group's name. name:"level 2"
created	The date the group was added. created<2011-05-01 For more information on using date and time in your search, see Searching by date and time.

Satisfaction rating searchable values

You can use the satisfaction keyword with rating values to search your customer satisfaction ratings. For more information on customer satisfaction, see Using customer satisfaction rating.

Table 6. Satisfaction rating keywords

Value	Description
bad	Tickets that have been rated 'bad'. satisfaction:bad
badwithcomment	Tickets that have been rated 'bad' that also include a comment from the ticket requester. satisfaction:badwithcomment
good	Tickets that have been rated 'good'. satisfaction:good
goodwithcomment	Tickets that have been rated 'good' that also include a comment from the ticket requester. satisfaction:goodwithcomment
offered	When you request a customer satisfaction rating, the ticket satisfaction rating status is set to 'offered'. The following notification is added to the ticket: Customer satisfaction feedback was offered. This means that you've asked for but not yet received a response to the rating request. satisfaction:offered