Windows 10 Settings not indexed

start-menuwindows 10windows-search

In Windows 10, when I search from the Start Menu or Settings, only Control Panel results appear, but not the new Windows 10 settings. For example, if I type "update", the search results are "Update device drivers" and "View installed updates"; "Check for updates" is missing. If I create a new test user account, it has the same problem.

This used to work. It broke when I reinstalled Cortana and rebuilt the index to solve a different problem, which was that desktop apps weren't showing up in search results, and/or after I removed C:\Users from the search index (I wanted more narrow indexing) but then put it back when problems arose. I tried a full reset of Indexing Options by setting HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows Search\SetupCompletedSuccessfully to 0 and restarting the Windows Search service. It didn't help. Any ideas?

Best Answer

I ran into this same issue and tried just about everything under the sun to fix it and ended up giving up and reinstalling. My friend recently ran into the very same issue (ONLY things from the new settings panel not showing in search results either from start search or directly from settings), and he said this fixed it for him: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Packages\windows.immersivecontrolpanel_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalState

First, make sure Indexed\Settings folder is not empty. You should have a folder such as en-US (depending on your language) with bunch of files in there. If it is empty, you should copy the files from another account or computer as described in the answer below.

Then, right-click the Indexed folder → PropertiesAdvanced → Check Allow files in this folder to have indexed in addition to file properties.

Click Apply and Exit.

He said in his case, it was already checked, but he unchecked it → applied → rechecked it → applied and that fixed it for him.

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