Search At The Top Option
Please allow users to choose whether to use Search at the Top or keep the search bar in the legacy location.
https://support.office.com/en-us/article/search-at-the-top-96fee452-80cd-492d-a35c-5c37584b416b
David Marks
shared this idea
Thank you to everyone who provided feedback through UserVoice, Coming Soon, in product feedback, and on related blog posts.
We investigated adding an option to support search in the old location. Unfortunately, at this time we cannot support making the search box location configurable. Future Microsoft Search updates are incompatible with the old location. There is also significant risk in maintaining the old search component due to increased complexity that leads to a higher rate of bugs. As one of the most used controls in Outlook making sure that we provide a stable and reliable search experience is one of our top priorities.
While it won’t address the feedback of having the search box in a new location, we do have fixes coming soon to address specific feedback about the new control. The first fix to arrive will be adding back the right click Copy\Paste menu. After that we have a fix coming to make changing scope easier by adding a more prominent scope changing control. You can read more details about these fixes in our blog post.
While our search success data is showing that the majority of users are having more success with the new search experience, we understand that moving the search box is a big change that can be disruptive. From the product team, thank you for your patience as we continue to learn how to make Outlook changes easier going forward and continue to work on improving the search experience.
1679 comments
Comments are closed-
Luke Meyers
commented
Please restore the old version of searching emails. I NEVER had an issue finding emails by knowing a key word, to/from, or around the date the email was sent/received. I would find the email I needed in less than 30 seconds. Now, i cant even find emails that were issued a week ago and I will know the sender and 50% of the subject line.
My productivity has fallen drastically. Stop fixing items that are not broken to begin with.
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Tobias, Rosemarie
commented
I agree. This is probably one of the worst things I've seen in a while. I would guess that the person who thought this up has never used Outlook. Please fix it asap! Thank you
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Anonymous
commented
I agree. The position is horrible.
I already have the MS-remote desktop bar at the top as well as a project-timekeeper bar.
I always have to move those around when i have to use the search bar.It is very annoying.
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Stefan
commented
Move it back - it's awful and confusing on top. Who in heaven is having such "great" ideas to change with every version something, that I need to get used to it?
At least make it customizable, that I can customize my own, personal view, and ask the next time, before you change something, if I really want to have it. -
Anonymous
commented
I agree. Move the Search Bar back where it belongs and also revert the drop-down menu for scope selection. Now I not only have to move go 19 miles away from the working field, but also have to make an additional mouse-click to change between Current Folder and Current Mailbox!
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Menno
commented
Many many people hate the new position, but MS made already clear that it is there to stay. Proving that MS cares way more about its own products then about their customers. Yet, I voted again because the placement now in Outlook is just terrible.
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Jason
commented
The position doesn't bother me so much (though I was happy with the old position), it is when you click in the search box and it covers the search refine options with 'Suggested Searches' / 'Suggested Actions'. This is a terrible user experience. How could this pass user testing?
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Anonymous
commented
In order to search for emails, you first have to do a search on where to find the search filters. Then after you find the search filters, a lot of them (from previous Outlook versions) are no longer there and the ones that are there are awkward and cumbersome to use. Once again, Microsoft F's things up!
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Mary Branscombe
commented
OneNote added the new 'it's so important to be consistent with Office' search in the title bar but it also still has a search field in the place people are used to so the query and results appear together. It would be great if Outlook did the same thing; title bar search to be like the rest of Office but a search UI in the Inbox pane where you can see the query and results in the same place, not separated
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StevenW
commented
Keep on getting questions about how to do this. I think it's fine to have this search for web based apps, but moving it to the top of outlook is a backwards move.
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Anonymous
commented
Search bar in the title bar is a bad move - much more user friendly in its old position
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Dave Webster
commented
WTF is going on with the new search bar location.
Make it moveable or put it back..Who makes these decisions..
I remember when MS used to make good GUI these days its all just c**p -
Anonymous
commented
Please move the searchbar back. The drop down, wich opens after using the bar covers usefull related buttons like search for "from"Name""
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black_wildcat@msn.com
commented
This is such an annoying change. The search bar has no place in the title bar. I'm searching my mails so it should be close to the actual mails and not somewhere willy nilly. And the window constantly resizes when I click on it.
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Robert McGhee commented
When Outlook is not at full screen it makes it hard to grab the top to move the window to another location as the mouse lands in the search box vs grabbing the window to move around or double click to make full screen.
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Ethan Rabinowitz commented
if microsoft cares about it users it will move the search bar back
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Palani
commented
Please move the search bar back to its original location..
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Yes Kuo
commented
Totally agree, it really drives me crazy when I want to search mails...
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Anonymous
commented
PLEAVE MOVE SEARCH BAR! Every time I start to type a search, the page is minimized. Every single time. I search through my emails constantly, so this is unbelievably annoying.
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Anonymous
commented
I agree! This was not a well thought out change to the UI. Some minor changes have huge negative effects.
PLEASE MOVE IT BACK!
