Stop Windows 10 From Doing Online Searches

Are you tired of your Windows Search in Windows 10 from showing results from the internet and querying online when you just want to search for a local file on your computer?  Were you one of the millions of people who had Windows 10 search functionality broken when Microsoft had a problem in their cloud/online services that affected that query due to Cortana and Bing search being built into the Windows 10 search function?  Well this simple registry change should disable online searching from when you try to search from your Windows start button and task bar and not only speed up searches but make sure your searches are only local and do not go out and query the Internet.

Disable Windows 10 Bing Search

You start by clicking on your windows start button and typing regedit.exe

Now this is the Windows Registry editor and it can be a little daunting for some people to navigate so I am going to guide you with screenshots.  The Windows registry has all of the configurations of the Windows 10 operating system.  The registry is a folder tree structure on the left that is like the old fashioned file explorer you click on the arrow to open up folders and when you click on a folder you see all configurations in that folder to the right.  You cant to navigate your way down to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Search

You can do that by drilling down the folders or cut and paste that exact structure in the folder bar at the top and it will take you strait there.

Click on the search folder and you should see a whole bunch of parameters in the right that begin with Cortana.

Look for a parameter called “CortanaConsent” and double click on it to edit it, the value should be set to 0.

Now if this parameter doesn’t exist, you will need to create it by right clicking on a blank area on the right and selecting new DWORD 32 bit and just make sure it looks like the above image with value of 0 and click OK.

The 2nd parameter you have to edit or create is called BingSearchEnabled and I had to create this one, it didn’t exist.

So you right click on blank white area in the right and click New > DWORD (32-Bit Value)

Enter “BingSearchEnabled” for the name

Value Data should be 0

Make sure Hexadecimal is selected (it should be by default)

Click OK

After making these changes then you can close the Registry Editor for Windows 10 and reboot your computer.  Now when you click on your Windows 10 Search bar and start typing something you are searching for Windows 10 only searches for local files on your computer and will not make Internet queries via Bing to show you results online in your search.

If for some reason this tip to disable Windows 10 Online Search doesn’t work or stops working, let me know.