Hi,


I am using Microsoft 365 Outlook using an OST file on my local windows PC that stores all my files locally.

I store all customer emails and all business-related emails for the past 15 years and the OST file is approx. 9GB in size.

Recently when I search for an email using the ‘search function’, I receive a message “Search Complete. Showing only local results”.

I have reached out to Microsoft Support as I am a business account user, and they suggested that I create a new profile. I am doing this now, which involves copying down all my emails from the Exchange server onto my PC again… creating a new OST file.

I expect this task will take a day or more to complete as the OST file is so large and also the internet connection here is quite slow.

I checked Outlook, File, Options, Search and the box is un-ticked “Improve search by limiting the numbers of results shown”

I also went into Outlook, File, Account Settings, Selected the account and clicked “change” and see that “Use cached exchange mode to download email to an Outlook data file” is checked and the slider set to download “All” emails from the past.

I also have a Windows laptop, also running Outlook with it’s own local copy of the OST file. This laptop also shows the same message “Search Complete. Showing only local results”, and the Search only shows recent mails.

Does anybody know what could actually be causing this problem of the Search not returning all the emails?

Any help appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
Dave