To protect your search privacy, you may wish to Turn off the display of recent searches. These are the same entries that appear in the drop-down when you search through Explorer. Windows File Explorer shows suggestion pop-ups as users type into the Search Box. These suggestions are based on their past entries into the Search Box. Let’s see how to turn off the display of recent search entries in File Explorer of Windows 11/10.
Turn off display of recent search entries in File Explorer of Windows 11/10
If you want to turn off the display of recent search entries in the File Explorer of Windows 11/10, it can be done in two ways.
- Using Local Group Policy
- Using the Registry Editor.
Let’s get into the details of the process.
1] Using Local Group Policy
To get started, type gpedit.msc in the Start menu search and hit Enter. It will open the Group Policy Editor.
In the left pane, navigate to User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > File Explorer.
In the right pane double click on Turn off display of recent search entries in the File Explorer search box.
In the window that opens, change the setting to Enabled. Click Apply > OK.
Disables suggesting recent queries for the Search Box and prevents entries into the Search Box from being stored in the registry for future references.
File Explorer shows suggestion pop-ups as users type into the Search Box. These suggestions are based on their past entries into the Search Box.
Note: If you enable this policy, File Explorer will not show suggestion pop-ups as users type into the Search Box, and it will not store Search Box entries into the registry for future references. If the user types a property, values that match this property will be shown but no data will be saved in the registry or re-shown on subsequent uses of the search box.
This setting disables suggesting recent queries for the Search Box and prevents entries into the Search Box from being stored in the registry for future reference.
If you enable this policy, Windows File Explorer will not show suggestion pop-ups as users type into the Search Box, and it will not store Search Box entries in the registry for future reference. If the user types a property, values that match this property will be shown but no data will be saved in the registry or re-shown on subsequent uses of the search box.
2] Using Registry Editor
You can do the same using Registry Editor as well. However, before heading the following way, it is recommended to create a System Restore point.
To turn off the display of recent search entries in File Explorer, follow these steps:
- Press Win+R to open the Run prompt.
- Type regedit, hit the Enter button, and click the Yes option.
- Go to Windows in HKCU.
- Right-click on Windows > New > Key.
- Name it as Explorer.
- Right-click on Explorer > New > DWORD (32-bit) Value.
- Name it as DisableSearchBoxSuggestions.
- Double-click on it to set the Value data as 1.
- Click the OK button and restart your computer.
Let’s check out these steps in detail.
First, you need to open the Registry Editor. You can press Win+R, type regedit, press the Enter button, and click the Yes option in the UAC prompt.
After that, navigate to this path:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows
Inside the Windows key, you can see the Explorer sub-key. However, if you cannot find it there, you need to create it manually. For that, right-click on the Windows key, select New > Key, and name it Explorer.
Then, right-click on the Explorer key, and select New > DWORD (32-bit) Value.
Set the name as DisableSearchBoxSuggestions. The default Value data of this DWORD value is 0, but you need to make it 1. For that, double-click on this DWORD value, enter 1 in the box, and click the OK button.
Restart your computer for the changes to affect the PC.
Also read: How to delete Recent Files and Folders in Windows
How do I turn off recent searches in Windows 11?
To turn off recent searches in Windows 11, you need to open the Settings app, and head to Privacy & Security settings. Select the Search Permissions tab and scroll down to the History section. Toggle the button off to disable recent searches in Windows 11. If you want to disable File Explorer search history follow the above methods.
Related read: File Explorer not showing files even though they exist on Windows.
