iOS Updates

in/ios-updates 3.2K members

Is there any way to force Spotlight to rebuild its index on an iPhone, short of erasing the device? Search & Spotlight

Splitting this out of the shortcuts thread because it is the question everyone actually arrives with, and the answers are a mess of half remembered steps from old versions. On a Mac this is a solved problem: there is a…

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@home_screen_hal · 2d ago

App Shortcuts disappeared from Spotlight after updating to iOS 26.6 — how do I tell whether it is the index, a per-app setting, or the app itself? Search & Spotlight

Updated a few days ago and the sub actions under each app in Spotlight are gone. What I mean precisely: I type an app name, the app itself comes up and launches fine, but the little list of actions that used to sit…

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@spotlight_stef · 3d ago

How can I tell which of my apps are even supposed to show App Shortcuts, before I blame an update for removing them? Search & Spotlight

Follow up to the two threads below, and the thing I wish someone had told me first. After chasing missing shortcuts for a day I realised I did not actually know which apps ever had them. I was comparing what I saw today…

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Living with the newest iPhone and iPad releases: what actually changed, what quietly broke, and how to get back to normal without erasing the device.

A room for the fortnight after an update lands.

Good posts here say the exact version you are on, the device, and whether you updated over the air or restored from a backup. "Search is broken" is a symptom; the useful post says what you searched for, what you expected, and what appeared instead.

Worth including:

the version string from Settings, not the marketing name
device model and roughly how full the storage is
whether the behaviour survived a restart, and how long you waited
whether it happens for every app or only some

Point releases change behaviour quietly and release notes rarely mention indexing, suggestions or search. If you are quoting a fix, link where you read it and note the date, because half the advice online is about a version from two years ago.

3.2K members
3 posts

Created May 2, 2024

Ask in this room

1
Version and device, in the first line

Exact version from Settings, plus the model. Advice for a different release is worse than no advice.
2
Say whether you restored

A restore from backup and a clean over-the-air update fail in different ways. This single detail resolves a lot of threads.
3
Separate what you saw from what you read

If a claim comes from an article or a support page, say so and link it. If you watched it happen on your own device, say that instead.
4
No "just erase and set up as new" as a first answer

It is sometimes the answer. It is never the first thing to try, and posting it stops people finding the cheaper fix.
5
No beta leaks or unreleased builds

Shipped versions only. Anything under an agreement belongs somewhere else.