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Search within Dropbox iPad and iPhone apps only gives 4 relevant results and not all of them

StephenIbbs

Whatever I search for, using the Search option bottom left of the Dropbox app, I only get a maximum of 4 matches. e.g. Search 'Archive' folder for pictures containing the word 'Sophie' of which there are 100s, I only see 4 results. The Mac desktop icon version works perfectly and shows them all. I cannot find any setting to help. Can anyone advise? Thanks

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Hannah

Hey @StephenIbbs, thanks for your post today.

I just tested this on my iOS device and I couldn't recreate the issue; all results appeared fine for me, so let's see what we can find.

Have you tried clearing the app's cache (tap on "account" > gear icon > "clear cache") to see if it helps?

If not, try to remove the app and then reinstall it and let me know what happens.

Thanks!

StephenIbbs

Thanks, cleared cache, no difference, deleted app, reset iphone 15+Pro then reinstalled, still have the problem. iOS 27.0.1. Screenshot attached and you can see only 4 matches, whereas the Mac will show hundreds with the same search criteria in the same folder. This problem is duplicated on the iPad as well. Any help gratefully received.

StephenIbbs

I have noticed that when I click on Search and start typing, the following screen appears VERY BRIEFLY and you will see it shows 4 ‘blank’ entries which then get filled with 4 matching entries once I click the blue search button, but always only 4, no matter what letter I choose to enter first. This behaviour is the same on the iPad OS 26.6.1. Hope this helps.

Jay

Hi @StephenIbbs, thanks for the details on this matter.

Just to confirm, if you search for the same terms on the Dropbox site, not within the Dropbox desktop application, do you get to see more than 4 results?

Whatever info you can provide, even if they seem small, will help us get to the bottom of this together.

StephenIbbs

Thanks for replying. To confirm, on the Mac, whether I use the Dropbox icon on the top task bar, or whether I use a browser to dropbox.com, the search works perfectly and I can scroll through over 500 pics with 'Sophie' somewhere in the filename. I have deleted and reinstalled Dropbox on the iPhone which is on the latest iOS, but I have NOT deleted Dropbox on the iPad, which has not been updated and is still on iOS 26. I only noticed this behaviour in the last few days, and assumed it was the latest iOS, but clearly it isn't because the iPad is going wrong as well.

StephenIbbs

trying everything I can think of. On the Mac I quit Dropbox then used Terminal to

rm -r "$HOME/.dropbox"

then logged back in to force a reindex.

Then on the iPhone I deleted the app again, did a hard reset of the phone then reinstalled but got exactly the same problem.

I did note that the latest Dropbox update was two days ago and wondered whether this was related?

StephenIbbs

I have no idea what has happened but I turned all devices off for 30 mins while I had my tea, turned it all on and everything has all suddenly started working, both on iphone and ipad.

I noted one thing that had changed. You will see from the screenshot above that even though I clicked on the Blue Search button, it stayed visible. Now when I click on the blue Search button the keyboard disappears and I see the search results.

Thank you to those who offered suggestions and please accept my apologies if I have wasted your time.

Jay

Thanks for the update on this matter. It's possible that this was a momentary delay in providing the search results to your device.

If you experience this issue in the future, or have any further queries, let us know!