Microsoft has acknowledged another bug in Windows 11, this time in regards to the Outlook searches users perform after installing the brand new operating-system.

Specifically, Microsoft explains that some users who upgrade to Windows 11 would not be able to get any results for their Outlook searches due to the search index that's being deleted during the installing of the OS.

Within an advisory published recently, Microsoft also offered a workaround, explaining that users just need to trigger the rebuild of the search index in Outlook.

"After upgrade to Windows 11, Outlook searches return no results. This problem may happen with any account where the emails along with other items are stored locally in PST or OST files such as POP and IMAP accounts. For Exchange and Microsoft 365 hosted accounts, this problem will affect offline look for the information in the locally stored OST files. Throughout the Windows upgrade, the search index is deleted and gets rebuilt following the upgrade is completed," the organization explains.

The workaround

Fixing everything is pretty simple, also it doesn't take more than a couple of minutes.

First and foremost, Microsoft says users have to manually rebuild the search index, and also to do this, they just have to launch Outlook, choose the search engine as well as in the ribbon visit Search Tools > Indexing Status.

"If the indexing takes too much time and also you need to urgently search, you can set a registry key that will tell Outlook to use its built-in search while using steps indexed by this short article under the temporary workaround section: If the indexing takes too long and also you need to urgently search, you are able to set a registry key which will tell Outlook to use its built-in search using the steps listed in this article underneath the temporary workaround section: No search results for POP, IMAP, or Exchange accounts," the organization explains.

The bug impacts Outlook for Microsoft 365, Outlook 2019, and Outlook 2016.