SharePoint Online library search not working

Steel Contributor

We have several libraries/lists in SPO where the search isn't finding anything. Have checked everything I could check (permissions, approvals, checked out, included in search etc.) and then created a ticket with Microsoft Support. The lists/libraries with this issue all have more than 5,000 items and the feedback I received was:

 

As per article (link), when you exceed the item threshold limit of 5000, this may cause unexpected behavior, which means that we cannot provide root cause analysis to see what exactly happened and if this is the reason for the issue. In fact, each test we run for these libraries will show us that the limit is exceeded and nothing else unless it's reproducing on libraries with items within the limits

 

What I understand is that the limit concerns the view. You can't see more than 5,000 items at a time, but I'm not finding any reference to search. AFAIK, the list/library search should still work when you have more items. Anyone else facing this issue? 

 

 

5 Replies

Hi @Pooya Obbohat,

 

Are you using the traditional views? 

 

Can you switch to modern and see if search then works for you? I found that with large lists modern works a lot better.

The site I'm investigating now is a classic team site. Don't see an option to switch to the modern view, unfortunately. Pretty sure that the other sites where we faced this issue were also set up as classic team sites. 

You should see a link just behind the left navigation menu that allow you to switch from classic to modern view...if it's not there, check in the list configuration the default user experience for the list

These are classic team sites, the option to change to modern in bottom left corner doesn't exist. I'm checking if we can temporarily change the list behavior, but I would also like to know if this should work.


As mentioned in the original post. Microsoft has stopped investigation because there are more than 5,000 items in the lists/libraries and the issue can't be reproduced in another list/library with fewer items. 

 

IMHO, this isn't correct. The library/list search should work even if you have more than 5,000 items. Microsoft has also not deprecated the classic experience for SPO. 

 

<update> have asked Microsoft support to re-open the ticket. Will be documenting everything here. 

@Pooya Obbohat 

Hi We are facing the similar issue.
Did you manage to resolve your search issue?