diff --git a/Cargo.lock b/Cargo.lock
index 79d1baf..5a59a1a 100644
--- a/Cargo.lock
+++ b/Cargo.lock
@@ -2444,6 +2444,7 @@ dependencies = [
  "shared",
  "thiserror",
  "tokio",
+ "urlencoding",
 ]
 
 [[package]]
@@ -3037,6 +3038,12 @@ dependencies = [
  "percent-encoding 2.3.0",
 ]
 
+[[package]]
+name = "urlencoding"
+version = "2.1.3"
+source = "registry+https://github.com/rust-lang/crates.io-index"
+checksum = "daf8dba3b7eb870caf1ddeed7bc9d2a049f3cfdfae7cb521b087cc33ae4c49da"
+
 [[package]]
 name = "utf-8"
 version = "0.7.6"
diff --git a/notmuch/src/lib.rs b/notmuch/src/lib.rs
index 07d6f91..f746267 100644
--- a/notmuch/src/lib.rs
+++ b/notmuch/src/lib.rs
@@ -454,6 +454,8 @@ pub enum NotmuchError {
     SerdeJson(#[from] serde_json::Error),
     #[error("failed to parse bytes as str")]
     Utf8Error(#[from] std::str::Utf8Error),
+    #[error("failed to parse bytes as String")]
+    StringUtf8Error(#[from] std::string::FromUtf8Error),
     #[error("failed to parse str as int")]
     ParseIntError(#[from] std::num::ParseIntError),
 }
diff --git a/server/Cargo.toml b/server/Cargo.toml
index ba1f885..09c74dd 100644
--- a/server/Cargo.toml
+++ b/server/Cargo.toml
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ serde = { version = "1.0.147", features = ["derive"] }
 log = "0.4.17"
 tokio = "1.26.0"
 glog = "0.1.0"
+urlencoding = "2.1.3"
 
 [dependencies.rocket_contrib]
 version = "0.4.11"
diff --git a/server/src/main.rs b/server/src/main.rs
index 9f655d4..214a809 100644
--- a/server/src/main.rs
+++ b/server/src/main.rs
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ extern crate rocket;
 use std::{error::Error, io::Cursor, str::FromStr};
 
 use glog::Flags;
-use notmuch::{Notmuch, NotmuchError, SearchSummary, ThreadSet};
+use notmuch::{Notmuch, NotmuchError, ThreadSet};
 use rocket::{
     http::{ContentType, Header},
     request::Request,
@@ -40,13 +40,14 @@ async fn search(
 ) -> Result<Json<shared::SearchResult>, Debug<NotmuchError>> {
     let page = page.unwrap_or(0);
     let results_per_page = results_per_page.unwrap_or(10);
+    let query = urlencoding::decode(query).map_err(NotmuchError::from)?;
     info!(" search '{query}'");
     let res = shared::SearchResult {
-        summary: nm.search(query, page * results_per_page, results_per_page)?,
+        summary: nm.search(&query, page * results_per_page, results_per_page)?,
         query: query.to_string(),
         page,
         results_per_page,
-        total: nm.count(query)?,
+        total: nm.count(&query)?,
     };
     Ok(Json(res))
 }
@@ -56,13 +57,15 @@ async fn show_pretty(
     nm: &State<Notmuch>,
     query: &str,
 ) -> Result<Json<ThreadSet>, Debug<NotmuchError>> {
-    let res = nm.show(query)?;
+    let query = urlencoding::decode(query).map_err(NotmuchError::from)?;
+    let res = nm.show(&query)?;
     Ok(Json(res))
 }
 
 #[get("/show/<query>")]
 async fn show(nm: &State<Notmuch>, query: &str) -> Result<Json<ThreadSet>, Debug<NotmuchError>> {
-    let res = nm.show(query)?;
+    let query = urlencoding::decode(query).map_err(NotmuchError::from)?;
+    let res = nm.show(&query)?;
     Ok(Json(res))
 }