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Fuzzy search for Business Central: find customers, vendors and items despite typos, missing spaces, reversed word order, fragments and sound-alike names.

updated: Oct 8, 2026applies-to: 1.0.0.1

This page applies to version 1.0.0.1; the current product version is 1.0.0.0.

Universal Search is built for the moment you know a record exists but cannot type it exactly the way it is stored. You can search Business Central records with typos, without the right spacing, in the wrong word order, with only fragments of a name, or by how a name sounds, with no wildcards or filter syntax to learn. Each example below is shown against demo records; try the same patterns on your own data.

Spacing does not matter

Type icecream and Universal Search finds the item Ice Cream Cone. Spaces are ignored when compared, so the reverse also works: a search with a space finds a record stored without one.

The query icecream finding the item Ice Cream Cone — *Spacing: icecream finds Ice Cream Cone.*

Word order does not matter

Type wheel front and the vendor Front Wheel Supplies is still found. Words are matched in any order, and a record does not have to start with the first word you type.

Reversed word order wheel front still finding Front Wheel Supplies — *Word order: wheel front finds Front Wheel Supplies.*

Typos are tolerated

Type omraoon and the customer Omaroon Corporation is found, even though two letters are swapped. The typo check looks at the first word you type and allows one wrong, missing, extra or swapped letter in a word of three or four letters, and two in a word of five letters or more. It checks only fields that start with the same letter as that word.

The misspelled query omraoon finding the customer Omaroon Corporation — *Typos: two swapped letters still find the record.*

Fragments are enough

You do not have to type the start of a word. Type tani and the contact Karl Itani is found, because "tani" sits inside "Itani". Fragments need at least three characters.

The fragment tani finding the contact Karl Itani — *Fragments: tani finds Itani.*

Several fragments work together. Type maro orp and Omaroon Corporation is found: "maro" sits inside "Omaroon" and "orp" inside "Corporation". Every fragment of three or more characters must appear somewhere in the same field, in any order.

The fragment query maro orp finding Omaroon Corporation — *Several fragments: maro orp finds Omaroon Corporation.*

Sound-alike spellings match

Type carl itani and the contact Karl Itani is found. Universal Search compares how names sound as well as how they are spelled, so Carl and Karl match each other. This works on fields where the administrator has turned on Enable Phonetic, which is on for every starting field.

A sound-alike query carl itani finding the contact Karl Itani — *Sound-alikes: Carl finds Karl.*

Partial words narrow as you type

You do not need to finish a word. Each word you type matches the start of a word in the record, so you can stop typing as soon as the record you want appears.

When the exact match wins

Forgiving matches never push an exact match down. A field that equals your search exactly gets the highest score possible for its weight, so a fragment, sound-alike or typo match in a field of the same weight never outranks it. See How ranking works for the details.

NOTE

Fragment, partial-word and typo matching run only when the stricter matches have not already filled the current page of results. On a busy search, refine the text or use a filter chip rather than relying on a typo match. See the field reference for how Max Results sets that page size.

What's next

Narrow a long result list and open the record: Use the result list.