Outlook is a useful e-mail program with which you can avoid logging into the website of your provider to check your inbox. Nevertheless, even this popular element of Microsoft Office sometimes falls short – especially when you cannot open the Outlook window at all.
This is especially frustrating when you are waiting for an important e-mail. Usually, outdated software or a profile in need of repair are the reasons why you cannot start Microsoft Outlook. If a specific error code is displayed, the problem can be quickly identified, but many users do not know how to proceed in such specific instances. If the source of the problem is unknown, then you’re up a creek without a paddle. In the following sections, you will find out solutions for typical errors and what to do when faced with more unfamiliar ones.
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25 GB emailFree domain24/7 supportThe error message, “Cannot start Microsoft Outlook. Cannot open the Outlook Window,” appears relatively often and is usually due to one of these causes:
Multiple possible solutions, which will be introduced in the following sections, apply to the current Outlook 2016 as well as to the 2013 and 2010 versions. The only place there may be isolated variations are with the different versions’ menu navigation and input windows.
Outlook’s navigation pane is usually found on the left edge of the application window. It includes the folder list as well as the menu items, “E-Mail,” “Calendar,” “Contacts,” “Tasks,” and “Notes.” This area can be adjusted according to your preferences, but such individualizations sometimes leads to errors severe enough that Outlook will not open.
The solution involves reverting the navigation pane to its default setting:
The resetnavpane command stands for “reset navigation panel.”
If this quick solution does not work, the next suspected culprits are the add-ins that are integrated into Outlook. These can either be defective or simply outdated and prevent Outlook from starting as usual.
Outdated versions of add-ins can cause an issue when trying to start Outlook.
Diagnosing this problem only works in the safe mode:
Once the launch in safe mode is complete, you will have narrowed in on the issue: one or several of the add-ins may be preventing Outlook from starting normally. To find out which it is, complete the following steps:
If the restart was successful, this further indicates that one or more defective add-ins are at fault. Now, you should find out which ones are the culprits by process of elimination:
If the previous method is unsuccessful or you still cannot open the Outlook window, even in safe mode, it could be that your profile – more specifically your “personal folders file”(.pst file) – is defective.
A .pst file contains your data files, in other words all e-mails, calendar entries, contacts, tasks, and notes that are associated with your Outlook profile. A standard outlook.pst is created the first time Outlook is started. However, you can create .pst files on your own, for instance to generate a back-up copy of your archived e-mails.
To confirm this speculation, you can try the following tricks:
If you’ve done everything correctly, Outlook will start with your new profile. This proves that the issue stems from your original profile. Using the “Inbox Repair tool,” which is pre-installed on your computer along with Outlook under the name scanpst.exe, you can restore damaged data files.
The scanpst.exe tool searches through your data files (meaning your e-mails, calendar entries, contacts, tasks, and notes) for issues. If it finds an unreadable or damaged section of data, it will automatically remove it. It is therefore possible that several data files are lost during this restoration. However, this is the best solution according to Microsoft, because the files in question are already irreparably damaged.
As scanpst.exe is deeply hidden in Windows’ directory structure and is sometimes difficult to find, Microsoft offers a so-called easy fix solution to solve problems regarding your .pst file. This functions as follows:
Microsoft keeps easy fix solutions (called “Microsoft Fix it” until September 2016) for a wide range of issues at the ready online, suited for all operating systems from Windows Vista onward. Here you can also find solution approaches for issues with older operating systems.
If you would rather manually runscanpst.exe, you must search for the tool in Windows Explorer for the time being. If your primary hard disk is called “C:” the storage locations for each operating system and version of Outlook can be found here:
| Outlook version and operating system | Storage location of scanpst.exe |
|---|---|
| Outlook 2016 (64-Bit, Click-to-Run Installation) | \Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16 |
| Outlook 2016 (32-Bit, Click-to-Run Installation) | \Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Office16 |
| Outlook 2016 (64-Bit, MSI-based Installation) | \Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office16 |
| Outlook 2016 (32-Bit, MSI-based Installation) | \Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office16 |
| Outlook 2013 (64-Bit, Click-to-Run Installation) | \Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office 15\root\office15 |
| Outlook 2013 (32-Bit, Click-to-Run Installation) | \Program Files\Microsoft Office 15\root\office15 |
| Outlook 2013 (64-Bit, MSI-based Installation) | \Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office15 |
| Outlook 2013 (32-Bit, MSI-based Installation) | \Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office15 |
| Outlook 2010 (64-Bit) | \Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office14 |
| Outlook 2010 (32-Bit) | \Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office14 |
Double-click on scanpst.exe (or rather, SCANPST) and proceed as follows:
Your .pst file is now repaired. Now all that is left to do is to transfer the restored files into a new Outlook profile:
Besides the widely-known error message, “Cannot start Microsoft Office Outlook. Cannot open the Outlook window,” unknown errors can also lead to a situation in which you cannot open the Outlook window. In this case, the following approaches can help.
It is sometimes the case that Outlook already experiences issues during its initial launch, and without providing an error message. For example, indications of this are that the PC slows down and that nothing happens even after the Outlook icon is clicked on several times. If a window does eventually open, “Not Responding” is probably shown in the menu bar. At this point, the only solution is usually to end the program manually:
Be careful not to accidentally end a different process, such as a system task process!
If the issue has still not been resolved, you do not have to proceed with a new installation right away. It is possible that your issue has already been solved by Microsoft and that the updates necessary for the solution already exist.
The 2010 and 2007 versions of Outlook sometimes have compatibility issues with Windows 10. You can solve this by installing the newest Microsoft service packs and updates.
To update Outlook, it is best to use a Windows update:
If none of the other solutions work, you can try Microsoft Office’s internal repair function:
If none of the described solutions are successful, you can try to reinstall Outlook. Unfortunately, however, this is the most time-intensive method.
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