Is "do a search" always better than "filter"?

[philnauta]

Thanks, yes, the 3rd option makes sense to me in this case, but Emmanuel said:

Filtering versus Search for

It is always better to have as many constraints as possible in the search, the filter is more of a 2nd solution if there is a constraint you cannot express within our current search engine.

and

Difference between datasource criteria vs datasource filtering

The search is more efficient as the selection is in the database, on the server, while the filtering is done on the page. So you have more options, but all the data needs to be loaded which can be quite slow. The rule being: always always use searches when you can, and use filters when you really need it and cannot use a search.

…so I wondered if I was missing something.