Business Central has a feature called Search in Company Data that lets you find any record by searching inside the actual field values stored in your system. This guide covers how it works, how to use it, and how to set up which tables it searches across.
What Search in Company Data Does
The standard Business Central search bar at the top of the screen is used to find pages, lists, and reports. However, Search in Company Data goes further. It searches inside the actual field values in your company data – the records stored in the tables that make up your Business Central environment. Furthermore, it works from the same search bar you already use every day.
When you type a value in the search bar, you now see a link to search your company data. Click it and Business Central scans the fields of the tables you have configured. It then returns a list of matching records, including the page where each one lives. Consequently, you can jump directly to the right record without knowing in advance which page or list to open.
The Problem It Solves for Your Team
Consider a common scenario. A customer calls and gives you their own reference number – not your sales order number, but their internal one. You may have stored it in the External Document Number field on the sales order. Without this feature, you would open the sales order list, filter by customer, and scroll through recent orders trying to match the number. In a busy system with many records, this takes real time.
Specifically, this kind of search is hard because you know what value you are looking for, but you do not know exactly where it is. The External Document Number is not the primary key. It does not appear in the main search. Therefore, without Search in Company Data, there is no fast path to that record.
Traditionally, the only way to find a record by a non-key field was to open the relevant list, add a filter for that specific field, type the value, and wait for the list to filter. That works, but it takes several steps. You also need to know which list to open and which field to filter by. For a new staff member or someone who only uses Business Central occasionally, this is not always obvious.
Moreover, the same problem applies to many fields across Business Central. Serial numbers, customer references, vendor invoice numbers, project codes – any field that is not the main ID is hard to search by default. In short, this feature solves a gap that most users have worked around for years.
Using the Feature in Practice
Go to any page in Business Central and use the search bar at the top. Type the value you are looking for – for example, a customer reference like SCV-1. You will see a Search data link appear below the list of pages. Click it and Business Central runs the company data search.
The results show you the matching records and which pages they belong to. For instance, you might see that SCV-1 matches the External Document Number on a sales order. Click the result and you go straight to that record. Additionally, the result tells you which field the match came from. Therefore, you always know why a record appeared in the results.
What the Results Look Like
The search results page groups matches by table. Each match shows the record name or number, the page it lives on, and the field that matched the search term. Indeed, this makes it easy to scan the results and pick the right one, even if there are several matches. Notably, you can click any result to open the record directly.
Setting Up Which Tables Are Searched
The feature comes with a default set of tables already active. However, you can change which tables are included. Search for Search in Company Data Setup in Business Central. On this page, you can add or remove tables from the search index.
For example, you might add the Sales Header and Sales Line tables so that searches cover all fields in both. Similarly, you can add item records, customer records, or any other table in Business Central. Conversely, you can remove tables that your business does not use. If your company does not process purchases, you can exclude purchase tables from the index. Overall, a focused list of tables gives you faster and cleaner results than a very wide search.
It is also worth noting that the search index updates as your data changes. New records added after the setup is in place are included in future searches. Additionally, the search works across all active companies if you run multiple companies in the same Business Central environment – though you need to configure the tables separately for each one. Therefore, take a few minutes to check the setup in each company if your business uses more than one.
Furthermore, the setup takes only a few minutes. You do not need developer access to change the table list. Any user with the right permissions can update the configuration. Consequently, the team can adjust the search scope as the business grows or as new processes are added.
Wrapping Up: Company Data Search in Business Central
Search in Company Data removes one of the most common frustrations in Business Central: finding a record when you only know a field value, not the exact page or list to open. It saves time and reduces the need to train staff on where every piece of data lives. Moreover, it is built into the search bar you already use. There is no new interface to learn. Therefore, the whole team can start using it right away with no training needed.
Next, try searching for a customer reference number or a vendor invoice number in your Business Central environment. Click the Search data link and see what comes back. In practice, most users find the record they need in under ten seconds – a task that would have taken several minutes of list filtering by hand.
Watch the full demo in the video above to see this feature in action, including the table setup and a live search that finds a sales order by its external document number. The video shows the full process from typing the search term to clicking through to the record, and it also covers how to add and remove tables from the setup page.
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