diff --git a/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-query-tokens.test.ts b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-query-tokens.test.ts
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000..3f829ace14a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-query-tokens.test.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+import { describe, expect, it } from 'vitest'
+import { normalizeCmdJPaletteQuery, tokenizeCmdJPaletteQuery } from './palette-query-tokens'
+
+describe('Cmd+J palette query normalization', () => {
+  it('lowercases supplementary-plane characters as whole code points', () => {
+    // Why: code-unit iteration split '\u{10400}' into surrogate halves, which lowercase to
+    // themselves, so the query never matched its lowercase counterpart.
+    expect(normalizeCmdJPaletteQuery('\u{10400} HELLO')).toBe('\u{10428} hello')
+    expect(tokenizeCmdJPaletteQuery('\u{10400} HELLO')).toEqual(['\u{10428}', 'hello'])
+  })
+
+  it('collapses surrounding and repeated whitespace', () => {
+    expect(normalizeCmdJPaletteQuery('  New\n\tTerminal  ')).toBe('new terminal')
+  })
+})
diff --git a/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-query-tokens.ts b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-query-tokens.ts
index 5fe2862b3ba..3ba9068b0c1 100644
--- a/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-query-tokens.ts
+++ b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-query-tokens.ts
@@ -17,12 +17,13 @@ function isCmdJPaletteWhitespace(code: number): boolean {
   )
 }
 
+// Why: iterating code units would lowercase surrogate halves separately, leaving
+// supplementary-plane characters uncased and unmatchable.
 export function normalizeCmdJPaletteQuery(value: string): string {
   let normalized = ''
   let pendingWhitespace = false
-  for (let index = 0; index < value.length; index += 1) {
-    const code = value.charCodeAt(index)
-    if (isCmdJPaletteWhitespace(code)) {
+  for (const character of value) {
+    if (isCmdJPaletteWhitespace(character.codePointAt(0) ?? 0)) {
       pendingWhitespace = normalized.length > 0
       continue
     }
@@ -30,7 +31,7 @@ export function normalizeCmdJPaletteQuery(value: string): string {
       normalized += ' '
       pendingWhitespace = false
     }
-    normalized += value.charAt(index).toLowerCase()
+    normalized += character.toLowerCase()
   }
   return normalized
 }
diff --git a/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.test.ts b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.test.ts
index e8ad556d43a..bf875ebe9a2 100644
--- a/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.test.ts
+++ b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.test.ts
@@ -242,6 +242,13 @@ describe('Cmd+J palette middle-band ranking', () => {
     expect(rank('linear integrations triage')).toEqual(['settings:integrations'])
   })
 
+  it('drops verb-prefixed settings queries whose middle words match nothing', () => {
+    // Why: the verb-plus-settings-keyword rule reads only the head and tail of the query, so
+    // "new terminal <junk> browser settings" used to win on those two ends alone.
+    expect(top('new terminal sparkles glitter browser settings')).toBeUndefined()
+    expect(top('new terminal settings')).toBe('settings:terminal')
+  })
+
   it('keeps out-of-order partial-word matches when every query word lands somewhere', () => {
     expect(top('font term')).toBe('settings:terminal')
     expect(top('font sparkles')).toBeUndefined()
diff --git a/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.ts b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.ts
index 274d0336cc5..3b643c1fe8e 100644
--- a/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.ts
+++ b/src/renderer/src/components/cmd-j/palette-results.ts
@@ -131,6 +131,17 @@ function rankingForCandidate(
     return null
   }
 
+  // Why: the shortcut rules below only inspect the head and tail of the query, so coverage has
+  // to gate all of them — otherwise "new terminal <junk> browser settings" still wins on rule 3.
+  const values =
+    candidate.kind === 'settings'
+      ? [candidate.title, ...candidate.configKeywords]
+      : [candidate.title, ...candidate.verbKeywords]
+  const score = cmdJPaletteTokenScore(query, values)
+  if (score === 0) {
+    return null
+  }
+
   if (candidate.kind === 'action' && candidate.verbKeywords.some((keyword) => query === keyword)) {
     return { result: candidate, rule: 1, score: 0 }
   }
@@ -165,12 +176,7 @@ function rankingForCandidate(
     return { result: candidate, rule: 5, score: 0 }
   }
 
-  const values =
-    candidate.kind === 'settings'
-      ? [candidate.title, ...candidate.configKeywords]
-      : [candidate.title, ...candidate.verbKeywords]
-  const score = cmdJPaletteTokenScore(query, values)
-  return score > 0 ? { result: candidate, rule: 6, score } : null
+  return { result: candidate, rule: 6, score }
 }
 
 function compareRanked(a: RankedResult, b: RankedResult): number {