# GNU find

Hacker Approved page: https://hackerapproved.com/p/find/

19 people recommended GNU find in Hacker News comments, 6 had mixed feelings and 9 criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026. It was recommended in 8 of 12 months, in 16 threads. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** People recommend find for fast, flexible file searching and for combining with xargs; the most common caveat is its arcane, hard-to-remember syntax.

Summary written by Claude from 38 comments. It was written before the November 2026 recount, and 35 of those comments still count.

## Why people recommend it

- Fast file searching (3 comments in the sample): "the Linux `find` and `grep` commands usually can find stuff much quicker than any 'accelerated' and 'cached' desktop search" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49708995)) "a find oneliner is still the fastest way to find things" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46649301)) "That's what allows find(1) to be so quick" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46393995))
- Flexible and powerful for searches (2 comments in the sample): "It's such a useful and powerful tool but it's arguments get me on a regular basis." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49018811)) "find is usually more flexible than ls for anything but the most trivial" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46530094))
- Pairs well with xargs (2 comments in the sample): "no additional software required, since your machine already has cron, find and xargs on it" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47432898)) "It's the answer to 95% of the problems with `find | xargs" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48987387))
- Already installed on Unix systems (1 comment in the sample): "macOS is POSIX compatible, so find(1" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46648843))

## What people warn about

- Arcane, hard-to-remember syntax (3 comments in the sample): "Find works, but the syntax is arcane" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48990738)) "Something about the find syntax never sat well with me" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49738132)) "I always have to look up find and xargs syntax." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46432080))
- Differs between Unix systems (1 comment in the sample): "macOS: the find there requires the starting-point arg" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49736462))

## Other command-line tools people recommend

- [fzf](https://hackerapproved.com/p/fzf/): 68 recommend, 7 mixed, 5 criticize
- [GitHub CLI](https://hackerapproved.com/p/github-cli/): 66 recommend, 10 mixed, 45 criticize
- [grep](https://hackerapproved.com/p/grep/): 53 recommend, 9 mixed, 19 criticize
- [Atuin](https://hackerapproved.com/p/atuin/): 51 recommend, 6 mixed, 21 criticize

## The badge

A product earns the Hacker Approved badge when at least 10 people recommend it, recommenders outnumber critics at least 2 to 1 (mixed feelings count toward neither side), it was recommended in at least 4 of the 12 months and in at least 5 different threads, and no single thread supplies more than half of the people who recommend it. Health and money products are never badged.

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "GNU find", https://hackerapproved.com/p/find/ (19 recommend, 6 mixed, 9 criticize; Hacker News comments, November 2025 to October 2026).

Counts updated 2 Nov 2026, with data through October 31, 2026.