---
title: searchScopes
framework: foundation
role: symbol
role_heading: Instance Property
path: foundation/nsmetadataquery/searchscopes
---

# searchScopes

An array containing the search scopes.

## Declaration

```swift
var searchScopes: [Any] { get set }
```

## Discussion

Discussion This array can contain NSURL or NSString objects that represent file-system directories or the search scopes for the query. For a list of valid search scopes, see Metadata Query Search Scopes. An empty array indicates that there is no limitation on where the query searches.

## See Also

### Related Documentation

- [File Metadata Search Programming Guide](apple-archive/documentation/Carbon/Conceptual/SpotlightQuery/Concepts/Introduction.html.md)

### Configuring queries

- [predicate](foundation/nsmetadataquery/predicate.md)
- [sortDescriptors](foundation/nsmetadataquery/sortdescriptors.md)
- [valueListAttributes](foundation/nsmetadataquery/valuelistattributes.md)
- [groupingAttributes](foundation/nsmetadataquery/groupingattributes.md)
- [notificationBatchingInterval](foundation/nsmetadataquery/notificationbatchinginterval.md)
- [delegate](foundation/nsmetadataquery/delegate.md)
- [searchItems](foundation/nsmetadataquery/searchitems.md)