No Results — Common Causes

The most disorienting rg experience is running a search for text you can see in a file, only to get empty output. Here is a systematic diagnosis checklist.

Cause 1: File is Git-Ignored

Symptom: The file is inside node_modules/, vendor/, dist/, or your .gitignore lists its pattern.

Diagnosis:

# Show exactly which files rg would search (does not include ignored)
rg --files . | grep "suspicious_file"

Fix: Use -u to override ignore rules:

rg -u "pattern"      # ignore .gitignore
rg -uu "pattern"     # also include dotfiles

Cause 2: File is Hidden

Symptom: The file starts with . (e.g., .env, .htaccess).

Diagnosis:

ls -a | grep "\.env"

Fix:

rg -uu "DATABASE_URL"   # search hidden files and override ignores
rg --hidden "API_KEY"   # just hidden files, still respect .gitignore

Cause 3: Wrong File Type

Symptom: You used -t py but the file has no extension or an unusual extension.

Diagnosis:

# Check what rg considers a python file
rg --type-list | grep py

Fix: Remove the type filter or use a glob:

rg "pattern" -g "*.pyw"   # match .pyw files manually

Cause 4: Pattern Is Interpreted as Regex

Symptom: You search for price[1] or 192.168.1.1 but get unexpected results or none.

Diagnosis: Special regex characters (., [, ], +, etc.) are interpreted as operators.

Fix: Use fixed-strings mode:

rg -F "price[1]"
rg -F "192.168.1.1"

Cause 5: Smart Case / Case Mismatch

Symptom: The pattern is Error but logs write error.

Fix: Add -i for case-insensitive or -S for smart case:

rg -i "error" app.log

Cause 6: Binary File

Symptom: A file that contains the pattern is not returned because rg detects it as binary (contains null bytes or unusual byte sequences).

Fix:

rg -a "pattern" file.bin   # treat as text
rg --text "pattern" .      # all files treated as text