How to Fix Microsoft Outlook Not Responding/Working Issue

If you have used Outlook before, at some point you must have come across problems such as Outlook not responding, stuck at “Processing,” stopped working. Also, it may freeze or hang. This might happen to crushingly frustrating for some users and can also affect corporations extremely.

In this post, we will discuss the reasons and solutions to fix these issues. According to Microsoft, these problems could be because of one or more of the following reasons:

• You haven’t installed the latest updates
• MS Outlook is trying to add an attachment to a user’s mail
• MS Outlook is in use by some other process or a program
• A recently installed add-in is interfering with Outlook (see snippet below)
• Your mailbox has reached the maximum capacity
• Your Outlook data files are either damaged or have become corrupt
• Interference due to an antivirus program
• Your user profile has become corrupt
• A conflict between Outlook and another program

How to Fix Microsoft Outlook Not Responding Issues

There are some of the ways to resolve these issues related to MS Outlook, that listed below: -

Step 1: Safe termination of Outlook in case of software hangs:

Sometimes when you attempt to close Outlook it doesn’t shut off in the first attempt; therefore you persistently try to quit the program several times which causes the hang.

In this situation, you can run the ‘Task Manager’ and choose Outlook and hit the ‘End process.’

Step 2: Opening Outlook in safe mode:

There is a far above the ground chance that the Add-ins are causing the Outlook to run abnormally. It is then suggested to run Outlook in safe mode.

To access safe mode, you must hold the CTRL key and left-click the Outlook icon. When you open the Outlook in safe mode, you will see the safe mode pointed out in the title bar in parenthesis.

Step 3: Disable your Outlook Add-ins:

In the earlier method, running Outlook in the safe mode might solve the hang problem, but it also disables all the Add-ins at the same time. Therefore, disabling the Add-ins one-by-one might assist you to catch the problem.

In this method, you can identify the Add-in which is responsible for these issues, Click File > Options, This will open the Outlook Options Dialog box.

In Manage, click Add-ins > Go. This opens one more dialog box, which has a list of all the add-ins. You can uncheck/ check the Add-ins one by one to locate which add-in is causing the problem.

Step 4: Close all other memory-intensive programs:

Out of all, MS Outlook is the majority complex and memory-intensive program. Due to this restriction, it occasionally freezes or hangs.

It is, therefore, suitable to terminate all the memory-intensive programs before running Outlook on your machine. You can sufficiently terminate the required program by ending it using Task Manager, as explained before.

Step 5: Repair Outlook data files:

Outlook comes with an inbuilt repair tool called Scanpst.exe to fix your Outlook data files (.PST or .OST) if damaged.

Consecutively to run this repair tool, you require closing the Outlook firstly. For Office 356Outlook, 2019 and 2016 Scanpst.exe can be located here-

For Any version: - go to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\office16\

For Outlook 2019 and 2016, it can be discovered here-

In Os 32 bit: - go to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office15\

In Os 64 bit: - go to C:\Program Files (x86) \Microsoft Office\Office15\

After launching the Scanpst.exe application, you will be asked to choose the Outlook data file which needs to be repaired the PST.

Step 6: Disable your anti-virus program:

Usually, it is the conflict between the anti-virus program and add-ins, which causes Outlook to freeze or hang. You can attempt to update your anti-virus program. 

If this too doesn’t resolve this issue, then attempt to disable the anti-virus program and check whether Outlook works without any problems.

Step 7: Repair your MS office suite:

If you tried all the above methods with no luck, then you should think about the below method.

Firstly, Go to Control panel, and then click Programs and Features. After that Select the MS Office suite and click Change.

Now after Clicking on Change will open a Dialog box. Select the appropriate choice accordingly.

Note: - Check options for repairing

 

Step 8: Kernel for Outlook PST Repair:

If you attempted all the above-mentioned methods with no luck, as the last option, you should consider using trustworthy third-party software for example Kernel for Outlook PST Repair. It can repair big sized PST files as it not limited by file size.

You can later save the recovered PST files in different formats such as DBX, MBOX, etc. Users can also Export the recovered PST files to Office 365, web-enabled email services, and Exchange Server.

Furthermore, it can also retrieve Meta properties of emails for example To, Cc, Bcc, From, Subject, Date, Time, Contacts, Tasks, Calendars, and Journals.

Conclusion

We have discussed different techniques to resolve the ‘Freeze and Hang’ issues associated with Outlook. Conventional methods might not work in this case; therefore, it is a recommendation to try using PST repair tools, for example, Microsoft’s Scanpst.exe or a reliable third-party tool such as Kernel for Outlook PST Repair. In several methods, Kernel for Outlook PST Repair tool is far better for Scanpst.exe.