Windows 10: outlook search not working for ~ 5 days. Tried rebuilding. Windows 11, classic outlook

outlook search not working for ~ 5 days. Tried rebuilding. Windows 11, classic outlook

:)

 

Windows 10/Outlook 2016 Search Index Broken

I have a user who can no longer use the search function in outlook 2016. It doesn't give an error, it just wont return results.

After extensive googling, I have found and tried the following solutions to no avail.

1. Rebuild windows search index
   
2. Delete windows.edb file and rebuild search index
   
3. Remove outlook from the search index, reboot and add it again
   
4. Full repair of outlook
   
5. Scanpst to fix corrupted PST files (they weren't corrupted)
   

I have loaded the PST files into my outlook and I can search them, and there is no issues with any other computers in the office, so it is computer specific and not related to the PST file.

Does anyone have any other suggestions short of a full reinstall of windows? I am literally banging my head on the desk...

UPDATE

After more tinkering, I removed Outlook from the Search Index and tried searching for emails within outlook, and it worked... just really slowly. When I added Outlook back into the search index, it stopped working.

Also, searching is working for local drives, just not Outlook

 

After windows 10 update search in outlook 2013 never completes

I've run into what I think is this same issue, although I'm not completely certain that it coincides with a Windows 10 update. I set up a user on a new Windows 10 Pro box, with Outlook 2013, and he found he was unable to search his PST files. We went through the whole standard list of troubleshooting search indexing options, including rebuilding the entire search index, without success. I also copied his PSTs to another system, and ran into the same issue, which eliminates disk errors, registry junk, and things unique to his machine. What finally worked for me were these steps:

1.In Outlook, go to Options -> Search -> indexing options -> Modify
2. Uncheck "outlook" and the folder under your user where your PST files are located
3. Close Outlook
4. Give it a few minutes for processes to exit
5. Restart Outlook
6. Go to Options -> Search -> indexing options -> Modify
7. Check the items you unchecked in step 2
8. Select something in your PST file and click search to bring up the search window
9. Select Advanced Find from the Search Tools pulldown
10. Perform your search.

After this I was able to search again using the quick search option at the top of the message list pane.

I suspect this toggled some internal switch in Outlook which the index rebuild didn't touch.

 

How to install outlook express on windows xp with explorer 8?

This was going to be my suggestion as well. I just wasn't sure if it worked with XP. It is definitely way better than Outlook Express, and I actually prefer it to regular Outlook as well.