Provided are techniques for image search with historical user activity metadata. Activity of a user is continuously captured to generate historical user activity metadata. In response to an image being taken, a range of historical user activity metadata to associate with the image is selected, wherein the historical user activity metadata for the period of time forms a historical time line that becomes searchable metadata of the image. In response to a request for any images taken during the range, the image is located using the searchable historical user activity metadata.