Windows "Search Bar" - how to get rid of this "virus"?

[Haggisman]

Turned on my PC today and some updates have run, and I now have this **** search bar in the middle of my screen:



Any advice on how to uninstall/permanently disable it?

I've tried Google, but it just gives pages about how to get rid of the search in the taskbar/start menu

 

[Hawk Tuah]

Windows 11? Try turning Widgets off in the Task bar settings.

Actually, it might related to the Search setting in the task bar as well.

 

[Haggisman]

Windows 10 sorry

 

[Hawk Tuah]

Ignore above. It'll be this. Just reverse the steps.

How to enable the new search widget in Windows 11 - gHacks Tech News

Learn how to enable the search widget in Windows 11 in the Dev Channel builds. We also take a look at what it can do.

www.ghacks.net

Hmmm, maybe not. Where's that setting gone now......

 

[Murphy]

Enable or Disable Microsoft Edge Desktop Search Bar in Windows 10

The Microsoft Edge web browser is based on Chromium and was released on January 15, 2020. It is compatible with all supported versions of Windows, and macOS. With speed, performance, best in class compatibility for websites and extensions, and built-in pr

www.tenforums.com

 

[Haggisman]

Enable or Disable Microsoft Edge Desktop Search Bar in Windows 10

The Microsoft Edge web browser is based on Chromium and was released on January 15, 2020. It is compatible with all supported versions of Windows, and macOS. With speed, performance, best in class compatibility for websites and extensions, and built-in pr

www.tenforums.com

Ahh, thanks, that looks like it should do it. Annoying having to figure out exactly what it's called in order to search for it

 

[skyripper]

Is it not just a case of clicking the ... And choosing 'bog off, don't come back' ?

 

[Haggisman]

Is it not just a case of clicking the ... And choosing 'bog off, don't come back' ?

The only options were "close" and "launch with windows" (or something similar) which was already disabled

 

[Murphy]

Was just browsing the tenforums tutorials and apparently there's two ways to disable it, that link i posted earlier disables it for all users but you can also disable it on a per user basis by clicking on the three dots menu and unticking auto-launch search bar.

Disable Microsoft Edge Desktop Search Bar at Startup in Windows 10

The Microsoft Edge web browser is based on Chromium and was released on January 15, 2020. It is compatible with all supported versions of Windows, and macOS. With speed, performance, best in class compatibility for websites and extensions, and built-in pr

www.tenforums.com

 

[Haggisman]

Was just browsing the tenforums tutorials and apparently there's two ways to disable it, that link i posted earlier disables it for all users but you can also disable it on a per user basis by clicking on the three dots menu and unticking auto-launch search bar.

Disable Microsoft Edge Desktop Search Bar at Startup in Windows 10

The Microsoft Edge web browser is based on Chromium and was released on January 15, 2020. It is compatible with all supported versions of Windows, and macOS. With speed, performance, best in class compatibility for websites and extensions, and built-in pr

www.tenforums.com

I'd rather remove all traces of its existence from the source code, but disabling it for all users is a reasonable compromise

 

[Orcvader]

Is there no option in Edge's settings as well? Seeing as it's tied to Edge I would've thought Microsoft would at least have the settings for it somewhere there.

 

[Rroff]

Is there no option in Edge's settings as well? Seeing as it's tied to Edge I would've thought Microsoft would at least have the settings for it somewhere there.

Microsoft and options... LOL.

 

[Haggisman]

Is there no option in Edge's settings as well? Seeing as it's tied to Edge I would've thought Microsoft would at least have the settings for it somewhere there.

No idea - the only time I've ever used Edge is to download Chrome

 

[Orcvader]

No idea - the only time I've ever used Edge is to download Chrome

You might want to open it up and make sure in Settings -> System and performance startup boost and continue running in background is turned off, about a month ago I was so confused why I saw Edge processes running in task manager even though I haven't touched it for ages.

 

[Haggisman]

You might want to open it up and make sure in Settings -> System and performance startup boost and continue running in background is turned off, about a month ago I was so confused why I saw Edge processes running in task manager even though I haven't touched it for ages.

Thanks - just checked and those were both enabled, so turned them off