Tuesday, November 20, 2012

How to fix broken search in Microsoft OneNote 2010

 

One of the best features in OneNote is the search capability. When it quit working today, it was quite frustrating. After doing a few Google searches and coming up empty, I looked at the Windows 7 search settings. Nothing appeared to be incorrect. OneNote would only search on the currently selected page. I decided to delete the cache file and let OneNote recreate it. After troubleshooting for 45 minutes this did the trick in the matter of a few seconds.

The cache file is typically found in the: C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneNote\14.0

With OneNote closed, using Windows Explorer go to that folder, find the OneNoteOfflineCache.onecache file and either rename it, move it or delete it.  I usually recommend renaming it so that if this fix doesn't work and you decide you want to you can always rename it back.

 

14 comments:

AO said...

Life saver!

Thank you so much for the fix!!! My workplace recently updated to office 2013 (Mistake) and searching all notebooks stopped working. I've looked online for solutions and nothing worked: not indexing the drive nor repairing the installation.

sometimes one simply has to get one's hands dirty to in order to get the job done.

Thanks Again,
A.O.

Anonymous said...

Works like a charm!

Jim Burns said...

This worked for me in OneNote 2013. Thank you!

Victoria said...

Kevin Moe .... Thank you. I really need the search to work. Phone and one drive working but after re-install of Windows and Office, no search capabilities on OneNote. I tried the repair and all it did was lose my activation licence keybut still no search capabilities. Then your suggestion worked wonderfully.

abctx007 said...

OMG wonderful and simple solution , thank you very much

Dwight B. said...

I'm not much for leaving comments but... You Rock dude!!!!!!! This worked.

RonPaulSpanish said...

Thank you very much!!

urbanofreitas said...

Yep :D

It worked!

Thanks for the knowledge sharing.

Unknown said...

You're the man! I just upgraded to Windows 10 from Windows 8.1 and was dismayed that OneNote 2013 search didn't work. I tried a couple of other "solutions" (rebuilding index, repair), without success - but your simple fix worked! Thanks!

Poolee said...

Thanks, this also worked to OneNote 2013 - it was driving me crazy!

Unknown said...

Worked for me too. Thank you.

Wurz said...

Fixed it for me! OneNote 2013 on Windows 10. Just updated to Creators Update on Windows 10 which seemed to break the search feature in OneNote.

Unknown said...

YAS thank you thank you thank you. This was driving me nuts.

Algis Jurenas said...

THANK YOU.
It worked perfectly. I did this on Win 10. Sep 18 2021.