Show context around old Teams messages from search results

Anonymous
2020-09-29T18:45:59+00:00

Looking for help with a particular issue with searching for older messages inside of Teams.

When I search for a certain keyword - say, "hot dog" - I get results that are both old and recent from past conversations. If I look at the recent results I get the full message context that surrounds it - messages coming and going.

If I read older messages, however, I only get the single message result without any surrounding context. This is only marginally helpful, as the context is necessary to add, well, context to the conversation!

Has anyone figured out how to do this? Is it an admin side thing that needs to change?

Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Teams for business | Chats | Search messages and conversations

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments

74 answers

Sort by: Oldest
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Anonymous
    2022-06-03T12:20:00+00:00

    Nice find Chris09! You should apply for a patent. Excellent solution!

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  2. Anonymous
    2022-06-13T19:14:31+00:00

    Couldn't get either above to work :(

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  3. Anonymous
    2022-06-28T22:16:59+00:00

    Could you clarify how this works?

    1. I can't perform a search in the popped-out chat window. Do I repeat the search in the main Teams window where I initially did the search?
    2. Where do you see "Go to message"?

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  4. Anonymous
    2022-06-28T22:54:07+00:00

    Could you clarify how this works?

    1. I can't perform a search in the popped-out chat window. Do I repeat the search in the main Teams window where I initially did the search?
    2. Where do you see "Go to message"?

    Wow, I can't believe this actually works, lol.

    To answer your question with a full example:

    I need to search for "password for ServerX" because i know i talked about it with someone, just cant remember who or when.

    • Open teams and in the standard search type in "password for serverX"

    Ah, there it is, I talked about it with John Smith on October 1st, 2020. 2 years ago on the same day I posted about this issue in this thread for the first time.

    • If you have talked with John Smith recently, find his name in the recent chats in the chat pane, right click then click "pop out chat"
      • leave this new window open.
    • If they aren't in your recent, search for the person to start a new chat and then click the "pop out chat" icon (the little square with the arrow) in the top right of the message
      • leave this new window open
    • Go back to the main teams window and search again for "password for serverX"
    • When it finds it, hover your mouse over the message and "Go To Message" will appear on the right. Click this
    • Your popped out window that you left open will magically scroll to where the searched text was and you can see all the context.
    • Curse Microsoft for screwing up yet another very basic function and making us come up with ridiculous solutions.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  5. Anonymous
    2022-06-29T14:41:41+00:00

    Wow, yep, it does work. I had been using /find to search through a specific person's chat, but it doesn't work there. It will only work when doing a global search. Still, that should come in handy. Thanks for the workaround!

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments