this isn’t complete - it’s only available in browser and not on the mobile apps.

this is critical, table stakes capability that massively impacts our ability to find emails

When I buy something (licenses, subscriptions, goods, etc.) or have an appointment (reservations, doctor's appointments, etc.), more often than not the receipts, confirmations, or order updates come from a third party (a payment processor, parent company, CRM, central front desk operating under a different name, you name it) and the email is almost never titled with the words I'm looking for (product/good name, doctor's name). The mobile Proton app (iOS in my case) doesn't even have the ability to build the annoying local database web browsers use for body text search.

Proton Mail PMs, understand this: when I have to look for something without access to my computer and that is time-sensitive, I am out of luck. Even with desktop web browsers, it takes time to build a local database. I've experienced this inconvenience multiple times and while I hate to admit, I regretted moving out of Gmail completely. Not sure how much remote compute cost you are concerned about incurring, but the additional cost implication doesn't justify the paid subscription if you have the right engineering resources.

When will it be possible for users to enable this feature permanently, rather than having to wait for a long download every single time? It's untenable to have to manually download every single message sent or received in orderto make those messages searchable. Please address this! Search is such a critical feature, and it's still not all the way there.

I've been testing switching my professional email to Proton Mail. It has not gone well. Without the ability to search the body of emails, emails older than a week are so turn into compost.

This has been fixed by the Protonmail team for Plus users, thanks a lot! You can now search message bodies https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/search/

Protonmail search is quite simple. 9/10 my search queries fail to find the relevant emails. Nowaydays we all recive so much mail that is not useless but also not so important to be save in a new folder.

The only solution is to leave it in the archive or inbox with thousands of other emails.

Please. An ealthy email workflow is to simply archive all the "taken care off" emails so your inbox acts as a to-do list.
This is only possible if you can then find back achived emails with a quick search.

Bridge is not the solution, it should be possible from ProtonMail app or the web application. It's been possible in Tutanota for years, why not here? Thanks

I am horrified that this feature isn't available :(. Even my e-mail from a local provider that I have since I was 6 years old has that.This really makes my life difficult now, such feature is more than important.

It looks like this was just added to Professional plans - fingers crossed for Paid!

I am ProtonMail Plus subscriber and I am super happy with the service. My only complaint time and time again is the search functionality which is borderline tragic. Now my parents are wondering if they could also have encrypted email and honestly if the search was at least average, I'd just subscribe to Visionary right at this second, but as it is now, it is a very hard sell.
One thing is the inability to search trouh email body, but even search trough subjects is wonky. I was for example buying a second-hand item online and was talking with 3 possible sellers. All email threads had the item name in subject, but one had it in slightly different format (without a dash) and it was just such a pain to always do two searches to find these conversations.
Really, please improve the search.

Honestly after using ProtonMail for a couple of years now it hasn't bothered me as much, but it would be great to see this feature implemented.

As a side-note (tho I am using only Webmail interface) you can also use ProtonBridge on Windows/MacOS with Outlook/Mail apps which gives easier access for search and organizing features. As well on mobile I am using Blackberry Hub+ Inbox app (Android) to easily search through all my Telegram, Protonmail, social media messages

For the unaware, Protonmail's encryption means search works by searching a local index. If you're not on a Visionary or Lifetime plan, this search only works for titles, not message content:
https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/search-message-content/

For Visionary and Lifetime users, they can also download an index of their message content.

My request, or feedback, or question, is why isn't this available for all plans? Or at least all paid plans.

From a technical point of view, I can't see any problems:
- I'm already paying for the storage
- I'm already paying for the data egress
- The data belongs to me
- The hardware belongs to me

From a product point-of-view, my impression is that ProtonMail don't usually gate cheap-to-provide features from lesser plans. The extra storage of Visionary has a real cost - letting me download my own emails does not. I don't need any of the other features of Visionary & paying 16 euros/month for regex is hard to stomach.

Constructive feedback welcome.

I still use Gmail along with Protonmail (e-mails literally go to both providers) only because Search function in Protonmail is an absolute crap. If I need to find some old e-mail, I just open Gmail. I am constantly questioning myself why am I paying for the service that does not have basic functionality and I still have to use Google's service in parallel.

Implemented and open-source from Tutanota since 2017.
https://tutanota.com/blog/posts/first-search-encrypted-data

FYI (received from PM today when this was reported as a problem):

"As you have noticed, within ProtonMail, you can only search by subject lines, sender, recipient, and the time of messages. Because ProtonMail uses end-to-end encryption, we cannot read any of your messages or attachments, and therefore we currently cannot search through the message body.

Our developers are currently working on integrating an encrypted body search feature which will maintain the current level of privacy and protection that ProtonMail offers. However, due to the complexity of this feature, at this time, we cannot know for sure when it is going to be implemented.

You have noted, however, that you wish to search for specific To/From addresses. Please note that you can do this through the Advanced Search option which you can access by clicking on the downward-facing arrow next to the address input box."

FYI (received from PM today when this was reported as a problem):

"As you have noticed, within ProtonMail, you can only search by subject lines, sender, recipient, and the time of messages. Because ProtonMail uses end-to-end encryption, we cannot read any of your messages or attachments, and therefore we currently cannot search through the message body.

Our developers are currently working on integrating an encrypted body search feature which will maintain the current level of privacy and protection that ProtonMail offers. However, due to the complexity of this feature, at this time, we cannot know for sure when it is going to be implemented.

You have noted, however, that you wish to search for specific To/From addresses. Please note that you can do this through the Advanced Search option which you can access by clicking on the downward-facing arrow next to the address input box."

Great question. ProtonMail staff: please, this basic function would be swell. Thank you

Word. ProtonMail staff: please, this basic function would be swell. Thank you

How'd that work out for you? ProtonMail staff: please, this basic function would be swell. Thank you

There are a dozen of these requests. Not enough votes in the world to get this feature implemented, evidently. ProtonMail staff: please, this basic function would be swell. Thank you