The lackluster Windows Search has been a hot topic ever since its introduction. One of the main points of criticism is the inclusion of web-based search results, which Microsoft started to introduced with the release of Windows 8.1.
Today, Windows Search continues to return local and web-based search results. What makes matters worse, at least to some users, is the inclusion of advertisement.
Microsoft published a blog post on the official Windows Insider blog today promising to improve the Windows Search box in the near future.
Here is what Microsoft plans to change:
- Less visual clutter. Search will only display recent searches, not other content, such as “top apps”, image of the day, trending searches, or games for you.
- Clearer results. Search results will make it clearer where a result comes from.
- Removal of promotional content from web results.
- New control to turn off web and Microsoft Store suggestions in Search.
- Local results have priority when they are the stronger match.
- Better app search to handle typos, dropped and extra letters, and partial words better.
- Settings results are improving. More relevant settings should appear higher in the results.
- Finding local files is improving and support for two-character file searches.
- Improved search reliability.
The improvements are integrated in the latest Windows Insider builds of the experimental channel. Microsoft has yet to announce when the changes will land in stable builds of the operating system. One potential option is the coming feature update for Windows 11, which is expected in the coming months.