Here is the solution about Cannot Start Microsoft Outlook. Microsoft Outlook for Windows can frequently get an error while you are trying to open or launch the problem. Often, it’s because of the corrupt PST or OST file and other times, it is because of some problem with the settings or configuration file.
Cannot Start Microsoft Outlook – Solution
Outlook for Windows by Microsoft is an excellent tool for anyone who wants to manage their emails more productivity and efficiently. It has a wide range of unique features and an intuitive UI that allows professional standard of management and tasks relating to emails, tasks, calendar, contacts, and more. However, once in a while, it faces few challenges that may be beyond the skill of a basic user.
One of those challenges is when Outlook fails to even start or launch. It can be frustrating for users because on the surface, there is not much anyone can do if a program doesn’t even start.
The error most users get is something along the lines of “ Cannot start Microsoft Outlook. Cannot Open the Outlook window. The set of folders cannot be opened”. Sometimes, Outlook may give specific error relating to the particular file that’s corrupt, but not always.
If you find yourself in a similar situation with the same error, don’t worry. Here is how you can fix it:
Create new profile!
The most common solution that works most frequently is to create a new profile altogether. If the PST or OST file corresponding to the default Outlook profile is corrupt, it won’t let you open Outlook. But if the profile file is fine and the rest are corrupt, you can at least open Outlook and make changes easily from inside.
Therefore, by creating a new profile, you can avoid that situation.
And do not worry, the settings window to do that is not dependent on Outlook as an application. You can go to Control Panel à Mail and get access to your Mail settings from where you can create a new profile. After opening “Mail” options from control panel, do the following:
- Click On ‘Add’
- Choose a location for your new file corresponding to the new profile. Give it any name you want and click ‘Ok.’
- Now select that profile/data file from the list and click “Set as Default” option above. You can see a tick mark next to it as a confirmation that the data file has been set as default for the Outlook.
Now try to launch Outlook and hopefully you won’t get the same error.
You will find your email mailboxes and folders empty because you are using the new file. Do not worry. You can either let the Outlook sync data from your email servers (which will take time depending on the size of your data), or you can go to “File → Import → Import from another program or file → import from .pst → And import your previous PST files for the respective email account. This will get the data from those local files instead of email servers.
Other Methods
You can also scan your PST files to check for corruption and fix them. To do that, simply search ScanPST.exe from windows search and open it. Locate the file you want to scan, and click “scan”. Outlook will look for damaged contents and will automatically fix them. Although, this method doesn’t always work, especially if the corruption is severe.
Most likely, you won’t have any problem after creating a new, fresh profile or data file. This is the most efficient and likely approach to solve the problem.