diff --git a/apps/dashboard/src/app/(main)/(protected)/projects/[projectId]/analytics/tables/search-bar-logic.test.ts b/apps/dashboard/src/app/(main)/(protected)/projects/[projectId]/analytics/tables/search-bar-logic.test.ts
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..86190281a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/apps/dashboard/src/app/(main)/(protected)/projects/[projectId]/analytics/tables/search-bar-logic.test.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,112 @@
+import { describe, expect, it } from "vitest";
+import {
+  getValidatedTableFilterQuery,
+  looksLikeNaturalLanguageQuery,
+} from "./search-bar-logic";
+
+describe("looksLikeNaturalLanguageQuery", () => {
+  it.each([
+    // plain substring searches stay plain
+    ["", false],
+    ["   ", false],
+    ["alice", false],
+    ["alice@example.com", false],
+    ["no-reply@example.com", false], // single token; "no" cue must not trigger
+    ["4c5ba425-6c22-4f65-9e33-3e2b1c5a8d1f", false],
+    ["/dashboard/settings", false],
+    ["utm_source=google", false], // bare "=" appears in real data values
+    ["john smith", false],
+    ["page view", false],
+    // natural-language conditions go to the AI
+    ["users who signed up last week", true],
+    ["verified users", true],
+    ["more than 5 events", true],
+    ["signed up before january", true],
+    ["emails that bounced", true],
+    ["count > 10", true],
+    ["how many users are there?", true],
+    ["anything at all?", true], // trailing question mark is always a question
+    ["users without a display name", true],
+    ["events from the past 3 days", true],
+  ])("%j → %s", (input, expected) => {
+    expect(looksLikeNaturalLanguageQuery(input)).toBe(expected);
+  });
+});
+
+describe("getValidatedTableFilterQuery", () => {
+  it("accepts a bare SELECT * on the table", () => {
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery("SELECT * FROM users", "users")).toBe(
+      "SELECT * FROM users",
+    );
+  });
+
+  it("accepts WHERE filters, default. prefixes, backticks, and mixed case", () => {
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery(
+        "select * from default.users where primary_email_verified = 1",
+        "users",
+      ),
+    ).toBe("select * from default.users where primary_email_verified = 1");
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery(
+        "SELECT * FROM `users` WHERE signed_up_at >= now() - INTERVAL 7 DAY",
+        "users",
+      ),
+    ).toContain("WHERE signed_up_at");
+  });
+
+  it("accepts multi-line queries and strips trailing semicolons", () => {
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery(
+        "SELECT *\nFROM users\nWHERE is_anonymous = 0;",
+        "users",
+      ),
+    ).toBe("SELECT *\nFROM users\nWHERE is_anonymous = 0");
+  });
+
+  it("accepts subqueries inside the WHERE condition", () => {
+    const query =
+      "SELECT * FROM users WHERE toString(id) IN (SELECT user_id FROM events GROUP BY user_id HAVING count() > 5 LIMIT 100)";
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery(query, "users")).toBe(query);
+  });
+
+  it("rejects queries on a different table", () => {
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery("SELECT * FROM events", "users")).toBe(null);
+    // prefix of another table name must not match
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery("SELECT * FROM users2 WHERE 1", "users")).toBe(null);
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery("SELECT * FROM users_archive", "users")).toBe(null);
+  });
+
+  it("rejects anything that could change the column set", () => {
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery("SELECT id, primary_email FROM users", "users"),
+    ).toBe(null);
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery("SELECT count() FROM users", "users"),
+    ).toBe(null);
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery(
+        "SELECT * FROM users u JOIN events e ON toString(u.id) = e.user_id",
+        "users",
+      ),
+    ).toBe(null);
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery(
+        "SELECT * FROM users, events",
+        "users",
+      ),
+    ).toBe(null);
+    expect(
+      getValidatedTableFilterQuery(
+        "SELECT * FROM users GROUP BY id",
+        "users",
+      ),
+    ).toBe(null);
+  });
+
+  it("rejects empty and non-SELECT input", () => {
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery("", "users")).toBe(null);
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery(";", "users")).toBe(null);
+    expect(getValidatedTableFilterQuery("DROP TABLE users", "users")).toBe(null);
+  });
+});
diff --git a/apps/dashboard/src/app/(main)/(protected)/projects/[projectId]/analytics/tables/search-bar-logic.ts b/apps/dashboard/src/app/(main)/(protected)/projects/[projectId]/analytics/tables/search-bar-logic.ts
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..0d28bac66
--- /dev/null
+++ b/apps/dashboard/src/app/(main)/(protected)/projects/[projectId]/analytics/tables/search-bar-logic.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,102 @@
+/**
+ * Pure decision logic for the analytics table search bar, kept free of React
+ * so the heuristics can be unit-tested exhaustively (see
+ * search-bar-logic.test.ts).
+ *
+ * The search bar is filter-first: typing applies a plain substring (ILIKE)
+ * filter over the current table. Only input that a substring match cannot
+ * express is routed to the AI, which must respond with a row filter of the
+ * shape `SELECT * FROM <table> WHERE ...` so the grid's columns never change.
+ */
+
+/**
+ * Words that signal the user is describing a CONDITION ("users who signed up
+ * last week") rather than typing a substring to match ("alice@example.com").
+ * Deliberately excludes anything likely to appear inside real data values —
+ * e.g. bare "com" or "www" — since false positives would hijack ordinary
+ * searches.
+ */
+const NATURAL_LANGUAGE_CUES = new Set([
+  // question / command words
+  "who", "whose", "which", "whom", "what", "when", "how", "why",
+  "show", "find", "list", "give", "display", "filter", "get",
+  // comparison / quantity words
+  "more", "less", "most", "least", "fewer", "greater", "than",
+  "under", "over", "above", "below", "between", "top", "bottom", "count",
+  // temporal words
+  "before", "after", "since", "ago", "during", "past", "last", "first",
+  "latest", "newest", "oldest", "recent", "recently", "earlier",
+  "today", "yesterday", "tomorrow",
+  "day", "days", "week", "weeks", "month", "months", "year", "years",
+  "hour", "hours", "minute", "minutes",
+  // state / negation words
+  "verified", "unverified", "anonymous", "empty", "missing", "null",
+  "never", "ever", "only", "all", "any", "every", "none", "not", "without",
+  // relational / auxiliary words common in questions
+  "with", "have", "has", "had", "are", "is", "was", "were", "that",
+  "contains", "containing", "starts", "ends", "starting", "ending",
+  // domain verbs that read as conditions
+  "signed", "created", "updated", "joined", "expired", "delivered",
+  "opened", "clicked", "bounced", "sent",
+  // plural domain nouns — people describe segments with these ("verified
+  // users"), while substring searches contain concrete values instead
+  "users", "teams", "members", "accounts", "sessions", "invitations",
+  "permissions", "channels", "tokens", "emails", "events",
+]);
+
+/**
+ * Heuristic: does this input look like a natural-language request (→ send to
+ * the AI on Enter) rather than a plain substring search (→ keep the live
+ * filter)? The zero-results fallback in the search bar catches misses, so
+ * this errs on the side of NOT flagging: single-token input (emails, IDs,
+ * paths) is never natural language.
+ */
+export function looksLikeNaturalLanguageQuery(text: string): boolean {
+  const trimmed = text.trim();
+  if (trimmed.length === 0) return false;
+  // Comparisons can never be expressed as a substring match. Bare `=` is
+  // deliberately NOT a cue — it shows up in legitimate substring searches
+  // like URL query params ("utm_source=google").
+  if (/[<>]=?|!=/.test(trimmed)) return true;
+  if (trimmed.endsWith("?")) return true;
+  // Single tokens (emails, UUIDs, paths) are always substring searches, even
+  // when their word-fragments happen to hit the cue list ("no-reply@…").
+  if (!/\s/.test(trimmed)) return false;
+  const words = trimmed.toLowerCase().match(/[a-z']+/g) ?? [];
+  const cueCount = words.reduce(
+    (count, word) => count + (NATURAL_LANGUAGE_CUES.has(word) ? 1 : 0),
+    0,
+  );
+  return (words.length >= 3 && cueCount >= 1) || cueCount >= 2;
+}
+
+function escapeRegExp(value: string): string {
+  return value.replace(/[.*+?^${}()|[\]\\]/g, "\\$&");
+}
+
+/**
+ * Validates that an AI-committed query is a pure row filter over the given
+ * table, i.e. it cannot change the grid's columns. Accepts
+ * `SELECT * FROM [default.]<table>` optionally followed by
+ * WHERE/PREWHERE/ORDER BY/LIMIT — anything else (column lists, JOINs at the
+ * top level, other tables) returns null and must not be applied to the grid.
+ * Subqueries inside the WHERE condition are fine: the `SELECT *` prefix on
+ * the outer query is what guarantees the column set stays identical.
+ *
+ * Returns the query normalized for embedding as a subquery (trailing
+ * semicolons stripped — the grid wraps it in `SELECT * FROM (...)`).
+ */
+export function getValidatedTableFilterQuery(
+  query: string,
+  tableName: string,
+): string | null {
+  const normalized = query.trim().replace(/;+\s*$/, "").trim();
+  if (normalized.length === 0) return null;
+  const collapsed = normalized.replace(/\s+/g, " ");
+  const table = escapeRegExp(tableName);
+  const pattern = new RegExp(
+    `^select \\* from (?:default\\.)?\`?${table}\`?(?: (?:where|prewhere|order by|limit)\\b.*)?$`,
+    "i",
+  );
+  return pattern.test(collapsed) ? normalized : null;
+}