Search again and include file contents

It feels like the s again. This thread is locked. You can follow the question or vote as helpful, but you cannot reply to this thread. I have the same question Report abuse. Details required :. Cancel Submit. Hi, I realize that you are facing issues with the search option of the File Explorer.

Did you make any software changes to the computer prior to this issue? You may please use the search option on the taskbar, to check if it is working fine. You may follow the below methods and check if it helps. Preview search results. View statistics for search results. Export search results. Export a search report.

For more information about Content search, such as searching for content in different Microsoft services, see Feature reference for Content search. Skip to main content. This browser is no longer supported. Download Microsoft Edge More info. Contents Exit focus mode. Is this page helpful?

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So why did Microsoft decide to make Windows search worse? Update Windows 10 : speaking of newer versions of Windows, I've written an updated article about searching in file contents with Windows 10 here. First, let me talk about the problem s that people seem to be experiencing. It seems to be the case that Microsoft changed the default behavior of the search functionality so that it actually becomes less useful.

On top of that, it also seems that in certain circumstances, the search functionality gets broken, so that searches for text strings inside files will not produce any search results, even if you know that there are files which do contain that text string.

I will show you how to fix both situations. In order to explain it best, let me work with a few examples here. I have illustrated this in the image below, where you see a newly created, empty workfolder on drive c:.

In this empty folder, I will now create a new text document a Notepad file, if you wish , named instruments. As you were able to follow along in the images above, I now have a text file named instruments. That's because Windows search in file contents doesn't work by default in Windows 7.

I want to be able to use Windows search in file contents as well. As soon as Windows has indexed my workfolder, search results will also start showing up when the contents of the file matches my search. Be advised, however, that the searches in non-indexed locations can indeed take a while.