Microsoft Outlook Won’t Open? 10 Ways to Fix

Instead of calling up the IT department

Outlook is an excellent full-featured, powerful andreliable email clientfrom Microsoft. However, there may be times when you may experience issues withOutlook not being able to loador open, which can be confusing and frustrating.

In this guide, we’ll show you some simple and more advanced troubleshooting solutions that can help you get Outlook back up and running quickly.

Why Outlook Will Not Open

There are several reasons why Outlook might not load or work correctly. These reasons include:

How to Fix When Outlook Won’t Open

Whatever the reason for Outlook not opening on your device, there are several simple and advanced troubleshooting steps you can use to fix Outlook issues. After each step, try to open Outlook and check if it works again.

The Work Offline option allows you to access mail that you’ve saved before Outlook stopped working.

Open Outlook and check for the Working Offline status at the bottom of the window. If you don’t see Work Offline, it means the feature is disabled.

To enable Work Offline on your Windows PC, selectSend/Receive>Work Offline.

For Mac, selectOutlookon the menu bar and then selectWork Offline.

By default, Outlookinstalls updates automatically, but you can manually enable or disable these updates via your Office Account settings. You can also check for available updates and install the latest one on your device.

Note: For older Outlook versions that don’t have the Office Account option, selectFile>Help>Check for Updatesand install the update.

Check your mail server settings to be sure nothing has changed that would affect how Outlook works.

Note: If you use Gmail, Yahoo, iCloud, work-provided email address, custom domain email address, Outlook.com or email addresses that end with @live.com, @msn.com or @hotmail .com, you can’t edit the settings directly. In such cases, Windows manages these settings for you so you can skip this step.

Safe Mode helps you start Outlook without add-ins, which could be in conflict with the app. This way, you can tell whether the add-in is the cause of the problem or not.

If Outlook works when in Safe Mode, disable all your add-ins and then restart the app.

Re-enable the add-in you want by selecting the box next to it and repeat this step until you have re-enabled all the original add-ins and found the source of the error.

Sometimes the error could be caused by more than one add-in.

Your Outlook profile contains your Outlook settings. If the profile is corrupted, you can create a new profile and make it the default profile used when Outlook starts.

Note: Back up your data files before removing your old profile because selectingRemovemeans all your offline cached content will be deleted.

Occasionally, some of the data (PST) files Outlook stores may become corrupted. You can use the scanpst.exe (Inbox Repair Tool) to scan your data files and repair errors.

See our in-depth guides on what to do whenOutlook can’t access data filesandhow to repair an Outlook PST file that’s damaged or corrupted.

The navigation pane displays your folder list and icons to move. You can run the/resetnavpanecommand to remove all customizations to the navigation pane and check whether Outlook still won’t open.

Close Outlook, selectStart>Run, and typeOutlook.exe /resetnavpane. SelectOK.

Compatibility mode makes it easier for you to run programs on older operating systems.

If Outlook is running in compatibility mode, disable it and check whether it works properly again.

Note: This step applies to Outlook 2010 and 2013 versions; Outlook 2016 doesn’t have the Compatibility tab.

If you’re using Outlook on a Mac and the app won’t open, rebuild the Outlook database using the Microsoft Database Utility to fix the problem. Before rebuilding the database, check whether the problem is caused by a fragmented or damaged hard disk and then run the Apple Disk Utility to diagnose and repair hard disk problems.

Note: You can’t manually repair or rebuild a database in Outlook 2016 for Mac. The application does this automatically for you.

Before rebuilding the Outlook database, make sure you have at least 20MB of free disk space, which is needed to rebuild or compact the database.

Note: Before the Database Utility rebuilds a database, it will create a backup copy of the database with the date and time the backup was created. You can find this backup in the/Users/username/Documents/Microsoft User Data/Office 2011 Identities/folder.

Get Outlook Up and Running Again

We hope this guide has helped you open Outlook again to access your mail and other documents. If you’re experiencing syncing issues in Outlook, ourOutlook App Not Syncing guidewill help you with that.

Share with us what worked for you by leaving a comment below.

Elsie is a technology writer and editor with a special focus on Windows, Android and iOS. She writes about software, electronics and other tech subjects, her ultimate goal being to help people out with useful solutions to their daily tech issues in a simple, straightforward and unbiased style. She has a BCom degree in Marketing and currently pursuing her Masters in Communications and New Media.Read Elsie’s Full Bio

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