Rebuild Search Index in Windows 7

Windows 7 indexes your files on the local hard disk for faster searching when needed. The search indexing service slowly crawls through your hard disk and indexes the files and their contents so when you search for any file, it can lookup in the index and show you the results quickly. But if you have made massive changes in your file system (like deleting or copying a large number of files), then you may want to rebuild the search index. Here is how you can rebuild search index in Windows 7 :

  1. Click on the Start Menu (blue orb in the bottom-left corner), type index in the search field. Click on Indexing Options from the list of programs shown. This would open the Indexing Options window.

    Rebuild Search Index in Windows 7

  2. In the Indexing Options window, click on the Advanced button to open the advanced settings for search indexing.

    Rebuild Search Index in Windows 7

  3. In the Advanced Options window that opens, click on the Rebuild button to rebuild your searching index. The older index would be removed and written over with new search index. This process will take a long time if you have added many search locations on your hard disk to be indexed.

    Rebuild Search Index in Windows 7

If you search for some items and do not receive the expected result, then your computer’s search index may be incomplete or may have become corrupt. In that situation, you can just rebuild Windows’ search index and see if it cures the problem. Rebuilding the search index may be time consuming but it can help you resolve the search result problems.