OneNote search is not working / indexing

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25 Responses

  1. ed says:

    Tried this. Still not getting search results. My fix was to delete the OneNote cashe.
    Close OneNote
    Delete everything in C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneNote\version#\cache except the “tmp” folder.
    Restart OneNote.

    It will redownload all content, so may take a while, but rebuilds the index when it does.

    • Nik says:

      Hey Ed,
      thanks for your solution. I will update my article.
      It probably didn’t work for you because you are using cloud OneNote. My solution was for the local version of OneNote.
      Cheers!
      Nik

    • dwd says:

      Thanks, this worked for me.

      I use a local solution win10 and don’t know why Nik solution didn’t work as imo that’s the correct way.

      Anyway I just deleted everything under the version# folder waited for OneNote to reindex I now get correct search results.

      MS does what MS does I guess.

    • Jay says:

      This worked for me too thanks

    • Yasser says:

      This worked for me. the solution is still applicable.
      Thanks for your help

    • Sam says:

      Worked like a charm, on both local or cloud notebooks.

    • Crystal says:

      worked for me. Thank you so much for this fix!

    • colinnwn says:

      On the local version of OneNote 2016, Ed’s recommendation worked for me. Thanks!

  2. kushal says:

    WOW!! it worked! thanks so much mate !

  3. Kevin says:

    Deleting the cache did the trick. Thanks a bunch!

  4. Greg says:

    The need to delete the cache files did the trick perfectly… and yes I am running desktop version but with my notebooks held in the cloud on onedrive so maybe that was the problem… Thank you for this as it is not mentioned anywhere else I found

  5. Ken says:

    Deleting the cache also worked for me. Many thanks.

  6. Frank says:

    I have the opposite problem with a local installation and cloud based notebook files. New notes aren’t getting indexed but old notes are found in the database. I tried closing the notebook and reopening it and the entire notebook was re-downloaded from the cloud and did get indexed properly. But, that didn’t solve my real problem which was why new notes weren’t getting indexed in the first place. [I tried the suggestions in the article to no avail]. My OneNote is from a Microsoft Office Professional 2013 installation, not the one that comes with Windows which is also on my machine.

    • Nik says:

      Hey Frank,
      thanks for your comment. So, if I have understood correctly, you are using and having indexing problem with the local installation of One Note 2013 and One Drive DB?

  7. Jared says:

    The steps in the article didn’t work, unfortunately.

    I closed the notebook with the page which wasn’t showing up in search, and re-opened the notebook. After re-loading all the tabs, Search was able to find that page.

  8. Mgcini says:

    Worked like a charm for me deleting the cache…

  9. S.Luca says:

    I had the same problem after the latest Window 10 update version 1909… I am facing several problems also with Microsoft Word. (I do have only licensed software here).

    One note seemed to do not index newest One Note files…

    Anyway your solution and description is crustal clear, and it worked to me without touching the cache.

    Thank you so much, one headache is away.

  10. Bill Moller says:

    Ed’s fix worked like a boss:

    “My fix was to delete the OneNote cache.
    Close OneNote
    Delete everything in C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneNote\version#\cache except the “tmp” folder.
    Restart OneNote.

    It will redownload all content, so may take a while, but it will rebuild the index during the process.”

  11. Adam L says:

    On a brand new workstation, I added a shared cloud OneNote Notebook and was not getting any results in search. Eventually, after creating a new OneNote page in the “Personal” Notebook, all search started working. Creating a page in the shared notebook maybe would have worked too, but tried the personal notebook first

  12. Dan says:

    Hooray. this worked a treat. It’s amazing how quickly, despite my best efforts at an organised folders and notebooks setup this all just becomes a bunch of junk when search doesn’t work!

  13. BCO says:

    Hello there!
    My OneNote Windows 10 Search Tool isn’t working properly too.
    When I try to find some handwritten or images/PDF text, it will only index my pages created/edited until the end of february. It isn’t be able to find any handwritten text or PDF/image that I’ve inserted lately… I don’t know what else I can do in order to fix it! I’ve tried every sugestion in this article/comments and some others, unfortunately without success…
    Does anyone has any idea how to solve this, please?
    Thanks in advance!

  14. Anna says:

    Hello, so here is the problem: the deleting of the cache, only made my search results better. But still not every site I have the word in, is being shown in the search results.
    I use an online Notebook with the OneNote App on my Windows 10.
    Right now the index thing is running since forever- no change.

    Is there any other option left to try??? I rely so heavily during exam times on that search function, I just realized how I can’t function without it.

  15. Akshit Malhotra says:

    The deleting of cache method worked
    Index rebuilding didn’t

  16. Burak says:

    Nik and Ed, guys, you two saved my life! Best to you

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