Recover open items on Outlook Crash
Please either reopen all open items (Drafts or Emails) after Outlook crashes, or at least provide a recovery option similar to Excel, Word, and other Office products. It is impossible to know what emails were open and they will all look read. At least Drafts you can go to the Drafts folder; there's no similar option for emails. It would be beneficial in recovering the items that you were working on when Outlook crashed and you can resume from the point it crashed rather than starting all over again(which is really frustrating). Also if I need to restart my computer for an update, I would like it if my open emails would save so that I could pick up where I left off after the restart.
Rietta Stoneman
shared this idea
62 comments
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Anonymous
commented
Until it lost all official support, I was a Eudora user at home on my Mac for eons. Restoring open emails was the thing that endeared it most to me. At work, I fight with my IT guy who wants to reboot my machine because it means having to go in and tack reminders by hand onto every message I have open so they'll show up in Reminders.
And just now, when Microsoft itself pushed updates onto Office and forced all Office software to quit, when Outlook came back up it restored all the messages just fine. But somehow no obvious setting is given in Options to have it do this regularly. If I shut down or restart it doesn't do it.
It's 2018, and I am still sitting here saying, "Outlook can't do what my MacOS Eudora program (and now Mailbox) has been doing for years!!!"
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obinna mbagwu
commented
This needs to be sorted out as soon possible, just lost all my work after a crash. I'm extremely frustrated.
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Sherri
commented
This STILL doesn't repair lost open emails lost on crash??!!!
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Anonymous
commented
This is a huge issue for me. As a multi-tasker, I can have dozens of emails open (not unlike having several folders on a desk in the paper world!). This functionality is in 2013 but not well known. I had my IT dept. set it up to automatically work every time I have a crash, power failure, accidental closure (that's for another topic as Outlook has no confirmation boxes for closures) or forced shut down for updates. This feature was for some unbelievable reason deleted in future versions. Why?! FYI, Firefox auto-restores browsing when it crashes. MS already wrote the software so why remove it? This should be a default feature on every version of Outlook. I refuse to upgrade Outlook/Windows until I can see this work in future versions. An absolute necessity. and mind-bending that we even have to point it out.
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Vikas Sharma
commented
if outlook crashes/closed when multiple mails are opened (as popout), on restart it should give option to reopne all the mails as earlier
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Are you serious?
commented
This is not solved yet? Aight, I will have a talk with my boss about alternative email software.
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Kyle
commented
If microsoft restarts my computer for an update, I would like it if my open emails would save so that I could pick up where I left off after the restart.
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Demetris
commented
Unfortunately, after outlook crashing there is nothing in Drafts. there is also nothing to recover. Everything is blank as if the composed email never composed. This happens on a new quad core pc with 32mb of ram, a fresh (one month) installation of windows 10 and office 2016 pro, all licensed. And yes this is really frustrating. Ms office is the only one program causing problems. After all I run the program repair, but problem still persist. Any idea?
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Demetris
commented
Composing an e-mail, during attachment procedure, outlook stop working and restart unexpectedly. Composed e-mail disappear.
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Anonymous
commented
Auto save or save that actually works when outlook crashes. My email was deleted because of a lost connection to a server. This is absolutely a joke and shows lack of testing and understanding of basic functionality that your users need. Total lack of attention to detail from your engineering team. It's an F
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Rudolf den Hartogh
commented
When you open Outlook, the folder structure of your main account is shown as it was when Outlook was closed. The Archive folder is always collapsed when Outlook is opened. It would be nice when it would open in the state as it was when Outlook was closed.
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David Smith
commented
Every time I start Outlook, I have to go into the Calendar view and reselect my Personal and Travel calendars to be shown. Every. Single. Time. Why can't Outlook preserve the calendars I have shown somehow?
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[Deleted User]
commented
FYI There is a solution:
"Open a command prompt window and run this command:
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office15\OUTLOOK.EXE" /restore
Basically, you need to find the directory where outlook.exe resides and then run it with the 'restore' option (without the single quotes) in a command prompt window. I have a Windows 8.1 machine and this works well on it. The same option works with Outlook 2010 as well.
Lastly, I suggest to create a shortcut for Outlook on your Desktop, then right click on it and click on Properties. For Target, it should say something like "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office15\OUTLOOK.EXE". Simply add a space at the end and append /restore so it looks like the above. Next time the session closes unexpectedly (e.g. restart after the updates pushed by the company's IT), you can simply double click on this new shortcut.
Hope this helps."
Works 100% for me. I can close Outlook at will (or accidentally) and double click the configured shortcut for all my open emails to repopulate. The only confusing thing is why Microsoft doesn't have a tick-box in Office's options somewhere for people to easily toggle this functionality.
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Bruce Polkes
commented
I want to reinforce what Amity said -- this is a critical work stoppage, productivity and data loss issue. So many people "live their work days in Outlook" that it really is a critical issue.
I have actually started taking a screen shot and saving it so i can see the open items if the system restarts or crashes. It still requires hunting around and lots of manual effort (if you can find the right email from the partial title that shows), so it's just crazy to have to even do that!!
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Amity Jones
commented
Running outlook.exe /restore from several locations does nothing. Emails that were open when the application crashed are still not open.
One would think this would be a simple fix for the Microsoft Office team, similar to the restore function that saves documents when Word/Excel, etc. crash and then are re-opened.
If the application wouldn't crash, this would be a non-issue. But when I've lost my place in emails, I have no idea what I had open at the time of the crash. The open emails are frequently action items I need to take care of, or forward to direct reports, etc. (which is why they were open). Because of that, this is a work stoppage issue which impacts productivity. In these cases, Outlook is causing extra work, delays, and lost opportunities. It happens frequently enough that I came here to find a workaround/fix for the issue.
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Anonymous
commented
I just ran outlook.exe with restore, and it worked much to my surprise! Open the Run window and enter:
outlook.exe /restore
Note the space before the slash.
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Anonymous
commented
It is somewhat weird that Outlook is one of the very few remaining products on the market that do no have the ability to very simple let the user "restore from last session". (Both handy when Outlook crashes (but just get up as nothing has happened) or when one needs to quickly close down PC), Spending a lot of time to carefully mark each and every open item in a way that one can eaisily pick-up work again is a fantastic daily waste of time, and often led to errors.
The ability of re-opening is not in any way consistent after crash neither. -
Anonymous
commented
any headway on this or work around?
thnx -
Bruce Polkes
commented
When Outlooks closes (unexpectedly/crash, by accident by user or for restart), please restore the emails that were open -- otherwise you "lose your place" not knowing which were still open and awaiting action. Like Google Chrome restore.
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Kim
commented
This used to happen in previous versions. I have not yet found a way to make it happen in 2016.
