M-Files iPhone Mobile Search option

Advanced search is not available on the mobile clients. You can check the available functionality from M-Files Feature Comparison.

It says I can search on metadata fields. So my understanding is that if I want to search based on a metadata field which in my case will be a property definition called Author for example , I should be able to. Or am I not understanding this incorrectly. 

I'm not sure which exact feature you are referring in the comparison, but it may mean that the (quick) searches you perform look in both metadata and file contents. This doesn't mean that you can set specific property conditions for the search.

In some cases creating a view which allows you to drill down to the property-based grouping levels might be a workaround.

I'm not sure which exact feature you are referring in the comparison, but it may mean that the (quick) searches you perform look in both metadata and file contents. This doesn't mean that you can set specific property conditions for the search.

In some cases creating a view which allows you to drill down to the property-based grouping levels might be a workaround.

Basically I want to filter my search based on a property definition. In the desktop version this is possible but in the mobile version I cannot. 

I know what you mean about the workaround but I was looking for a search feature just to show the end user

M-Files iOS application supports also facets. With facets it is possible to filter search results based on example certain property value. This requires that Smart Search is used, facets are configured to vault and gRPC connection is used. 

Configuring Search Facets (m-files.com)