Windows Server 2025 Taskbar Search Not Working Properly

Question

I upgraded from Windows Server 2022 to Windows Server 2025. After the upgrade, the Search tab on the Taskbar stopped working correctly. When I click on a program listed under “Recent” in the Search tab, the entire Search interface becomes unresponsive. Additionally, the search function no longer works at all.

Here are the troubleshooting steps I’ve tried:

1. Windows Update
2. Restarted the Windows Search service (temporarily resolved the issue)
3. Restarted Windows Explorer via Task Manager (temporarily resolved the issue)
4. Rebuilt the search index (didn’t resolve the issue)
5. Executed Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted, then ran ResetWindowsSearchBox.ps1 (didn’t resolve the issue)
6. Ran Get-AppXPackage | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml"} (didn’t resolve the issue)
7. DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /Restorehealth, sfc /scannow (no issues found)
8. Re-upgraded with the Windows Server 2025 (Nov 2024) ISO (didn’t resolve the issue)

None of these methods have permanently fixed the problem. I’d really like to solve this without formatting the server.

https://youtu.be/tnTFHrUjxYo

Answer 1

I would genuinely like to understand the design rationale behind the decision to retain the Windows Search task — built on WebView2 and therefore clearly leveraging client-oriented components — within Windows Server 2025 Desktop Experience.

In many scenarios, we are already required to deploy Windows Server with a graphical interface because the Core edition is not always compatible with certain legacy applications or management environments. However, this should not automatically justify importing consumer-grade UX components into a server-oriented operating system.

Does it really make architectural sense for a Search process to consume over 100 MB of RAM on a system whose primary goals should be stability, consistency, and minimisation of the software footprint?

It would be useful to understand whether this design choice addresses a specific technical requirement, or whether it is simply the result of codebase alignment with the client edition.

Answer 2

@Joe Elter

I resolved the issue by referring to the methods described on the following websites:

• https://www.windowscentral.com/software-apps/windows-11/how-to-restart-the-start-menu-on-windows-11

• https://www.minitool.com/news/windows-11-taskbar-not-working.html

However, after using the solutions provided in these articles, I encountered a recurring issue. Every time I run the sfc /scannow command, it displays the message: "Windows Resource Protection found corrupt files and successfully repaired them."

It's not a major problem, just a minor issue related to the Edge WebView2 Runtime DLL. This problem is expected to be resolved when I perform an in-place upgrade using the upcoming December 2024 VLSC ISO file.