(You can make this a bit faster by telling Windows to always start searching when you type in File Explorer.) if you’re searching an indexed location, you’ll get results instantly. Then, type a search into the box at the top right corner of the window and press Enter. If you want to search your entire C: drive, head to C. For example, if you just want to search your Downloads folder, open the Downloads folder. In File Explorer, navigate to the folder you want to search. If you frequently find yourself frustrated with the Start menu search feature, forget about it and head to File Explorer when you want to search. By default, it will index data in your user account’s folders and not much else. Windows automatically scans and monitors these folders, building the search index it uses when you search via the Start menu. You’ll be able to choose your indexed search locations. To improve the results, click the “Filters” option in the menu and then click the “Select locations” button at the bottom of the menu. RELATED: How to Choose Which Files Windows Search Indexes on Your PC These categories are all narrow and include online locations, like your OneDrive. The problem is that there’s no way to search just all your local files. You can narrow this down by clicking the “Filters” button and selecting “Documents”, “Folders”, “Photos”, or “Videos”. This won’t always work because the Start menu only searches indexed locations, and there’s no way to search other areas of your system from here without adding them to the index.īy default, the Start menu searches everything it can-indexed files, Bing, OneDrive, the Windows Store, and other online locations. Search for a file stored in an indexed location and it should appear somewhere in the list. However, you can still use the Start menu for some basic file searches.

Google files for windows 10