diff --git a/modules/editor/evil/config.el b/modules/editor/evil/config.el
index 296f5c577..63a5e8fa3 100644
--- a/modules/editor/evil/config.el
+++ b/modules/editor/evil/config.el
@@ -49,7 +49,10 @@ directives. By default, this only recognizes C directives.")
         evil-insert-state-cursor 'bar
         evil-visual-state-cursor 'hollow
         ;; must be set before evil/evil-collection is loaded
-        evil-want-keybinding (not (featurep! +everywhere)))
+        evil-want-keybinding (not (featurep! +everywhere))
+        ;; Only do highlighting in selected window so that Emacs has less work
+        ;; to do highlighting them all.
+        evil-ex-interactive-search-highlight 'selected-window)
 
   :config
   (evil-select-search-module 'evil-search-module 'evil-search)