diff --git a/packages/cms/src/api/searchRoute.js b/packages/cms/src/api/searchRoute.js
index 59f20af7a..785ee8068 100644
--- a/packages/cms/src/api/searchRoute.js
+++ b/packages/cms/src/api/searchRoute.js
@@ -578,7 +578,7 @@ module.exports = function(app) {
         let contentIds = [];
         const {searchIndexByLocale} = app.settings.cache;
 
-        if (CANON_CMS_LUNR && searchIndexByLocale[locale]) {
+        if (yn(CANON_CMS_LUNR) && searchIndexByLocale[locale]) {
           const terms = query.split(" ").map(d => `+${d}~1*`).join(" ");
           const lunrResults = searchIndexByLocale[locale].search(terms);
           contentIds = lunrResults.map(d => d.ref);
diff --git a/packages/cms/src/cache/searchIndexByLocale.js b/packages/cms/src/cache/searchIndexByLocale.js
index 7c1818252..e1c468971 100644
--- a/packages/cms/src/cache/searchIndexByLocale.js
+++ b/packages/cms/src/cache/searchIndexByLocale.js
@@ -1,5 +1,6 @@
 const lunr = require("lunr");
 require("lunr-languages/lunr.stemmer.support")(lunr);
+const yn = require("yn");
 
 const whitelist = ["ar", "da", "de", "du", "en", "es", "fi", "hi", "hu", "it", "ja", "jp", "nl", "no", "pt", "ro", "ru", "sv", "ta", "th", "tr", "vi", "zh"];
 
@@ -13,7 +14,7 @@ for (const locale of locales.filter(d => d !== "en")) {
 
 module.exports = async function(app) {
 
-  if (!CANON_CMS_LUNR) return {};
+  if (!yn(CANON_CMS_LUNR)) return {};
 
   const {db} = app;