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I am unable to find a way to disable the Microsoft Outlook search option "show most relevant search results on top" via a systematic / automated approach so that I can deploy this to all of our users.

The setting is located via in the GUI via the following:

"File" -> "Options" -> "Search" -> "Show most relevant search results on top".

What I have tried so far:

Group Policy

The most recent ADMX for configuring Microsoft 365 / Office etc does not seem to have an option to configure this:

https://admx.help/?Category=Office2016&Policy=outlk16.Office.Microsoft.Policies.Windows::L_HitHighlightingcolor

Registry

After inspecting the applications modifications to the registry via "Process Monitor" when setting the option via the GUI, I have then modified the following key to 0 of which had no impact.

Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Search\SearchTopResults

Adding this key to the following location as per Christy's answer below also has no effect to outlook:

Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\office\16.0\outlook\Search\SearchTopResults

Office configuration Tool

The office configuration tool also does not appear to show any possibility of disabling this option under "Application Prferences":

https://config.office.com/deploymentsettings

PS - the environment that this being tested in is connected to active directory with policies applied through an existing "group policy" deployment.

If anyone is able to give any insight on how to do this it would be greatly appreciated.

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1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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Based on my research on the below registry: Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\office\16.0\outlook\Search\SearchTopResults

When the value of SearchTopResults is set to 1, the "show most relevant search results on top" option is selected. On the other hand, when the value of SearchTopResults is set to 0, the "show most relevant search results on top" option is unselected. enter image description here

So it's suggested that you could try to open Registry Editor and locate the path (especially please note the Policies key), if the path can't be found, please try to manually create the path and values to check if there're any differences.

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  • Thanks @Christy , unfortunately this is not successful, the key path didnt exist so I manually created this under the policies parent path as per your suggestion. I will update the question with this information.
    – CraftyB
    Commented Sep 16, 2022 at 10:22
  • Have you restarted Outlook after changing the registry?
    – Christy
    Commented Sep 19, 2022 at 9:39
  • Yes I tried the following combinations (1 - changing registry whilst Outlook was closed then starting outlook. 2 - changing registry whilst outlook was open and restarting the application.). Are you able to confirm if this is successful for you? It seems like changing the registry has no impact on outlook at all when I have tried.
    – CraftyB
    Commented Sep 19, 2022 at 10:55
  • It's suggested that you could go back and check if you have changed the value of the registry successfully. On the other hand, does this registry work on other computers?
    – Christy
    Commented Sep 22, 2022 at 6:41
  • I will be testing this on a system that has not been added to the domain to see if its group policy that is preventing the change from being possible.
    – CraftyB
    Commented Sep 22, 2022 at 18:41

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