The Search service includes the Tokenize Search Terms setting, which applies to the standard Esri search (that is, the query-backed search on Esri map and feature services) from the global Search component.

If enabled, this setting breaks up the search term into sub-terms (tokenization) and returns the best results. This is ideal if users are using Search to discover what items exists.

Disable this setting if users are using Search to find something that is already known, such as an ID or address sorted in the Esri data. For example, if you anticipate your user will search for specific items (such as Water Pipe ABDOIDF), then you do not want to break up the search term. You want Search to return the exact results.