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I use VoidTools Everything search tool instead of Windows' built-in search. On my desktop and laptop, hitting the Windows key and typing "Everything" would make that tool show up first on the Start menu, which means that I could add the Enter key to the mix and quickly open the tool. That has become muscle memory for me when searching.

Ever since a recent Windows update, a new option shows up on the start menu, above Everything: "Make everything bigger" in system settings. This only happens on my desktop, making the process to quickly open the tool different on different computers. I want the "Search Everything" app to show up first, so that it's selected first and hitting enter just opens it.

Alternatively, I could change my muscle memory to type in "Search" (which makes "Search Everything" show up first, for now at least), or add a press of the down arrow to get to the next options down, but I'd really prefer to adjust the search results within Windows if possible. Any ideas?

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How to define a Hotkey to open Everything

  1. In Everything, from the Tools menu, click Options.
  2. Click the Keyboard tab.
  3. Choose a hotkey method.
  4. Press a new key combination.
  5. Click OK.

Definition of hotkey methods

New window - Always show a new Everything search window.

Show window - Show the Everything search window if one exists, otherwise create a new Everything search window.

Toggle window - Hide the Everything search window if it is currently in the foreground, otherwise show the Everything search window if one exists, otherwise create a new Everything search window.

Source: Voidtools

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  • This is a great find, I didn't realize it had its own hotkey functionality built-in. For what it's worth, after some time typing "everything" into Windows search and choosing the second option, Windows eventually caught on and made it show up first. I have no idea how many tries it takes for the algorithm to rerank it, but it did happen eventually.
    – Jake
    Feb 17, 2021 at 2:10
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You don't need to run Everything from the Start menu.

Everything will show an icon in the traybar if in Options > General > UI you enable "Show tray icon". A double-click on the icon will start Everything (with much less muscle action). This also requires the option of "Run in background".

Everything will also add an entry to the context-menu in Explorer. You may right-click any folder and choose "Search Everything..." in order to invoke it on this folder.

Keyboard oriented methods are:

Move the keyboard focus to the traybar with Win+B, where you may select the Everything icon using the arrow keys and execute with Space or Enter.

You may also put an Everything icon on the desktop, right-click it and select Properties, then in the "Shortcut" tab define a keyboard shortcut key for launching it directly.

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    "much less muscle action" is relative, my hands are usually on the keyboard so I would prefer a keyboard-based solution like what I had prior to a Windows update, but I appreciate the response! It's an option!
    – Jake
    Nov 18, 2020 at 21:45
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    No problem - I added a "muscle action" section to my answer.
    – harrymc
    Nov 18, 2020 at 22:01
  • @harrymc LOL! :) I admire your very accomodating attitude, pleasant to see on this site. +1
    – Sabuncu
    Apr 2, 2021 at 10:35

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