Outlook 365 crashing when printing emails | Resolution: Fix Broken Signature

Question

A fully up to date version of Outlook 365 on a fully up to date version of Windows 21H2 is crashing every time a user attempts to print an email.

This occurs with multiple users, as well as the same user on completely different devices.

Troubleshooting attempted so far:

removed printers and added back -> crashed
change default printer -> crashed
Close outlook, restart print spooler -> crashed
delete outprint file in roaming app data -> crashed
start outlook in safe mode -> crashed
Repair office installation - online repair -> crashed
Deleted entire outlook folder in AppData, started in safemode - printing option worked one time only
Started in regular mode after adding printers -> crashed
started in safemode after adding printer -> crashed
removed printers - started in safe mode -> crashed
Deleted outlook folder in app data, started in safemode -> crashed
Disabled all add-ins - printing option worked one time only
Deleted Outlook profile and recreated profile -> crashed
Had user sign into a fresh desktop on a different machine and sign into outlook app. Attempted to print an email -> crashed

It would appear that after occasional changes, it will work once, and crash again

Attempted steps from these articles to no avail:
https://www.guidingtech.com/top-ways-to-fix-outlook-not-responding-when-trying-to-print/
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook_com/forum/all/outlook-crashes-when-printing/433949b6-4ff2-4c09-9743-12fb7eb402a0

We are currently running more tests on a machine that proved to have issues but a different account in hopes of isolating the cause of the issue.
Potential causes:

• Windows 10
• Failed or Corrupted windows update
• Office 365
• Outlook 365
• Print Server
• Printer Drivers

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Update

All the computers that are having issues have the office 365 update 15330.20246 or later (15330.20264)

It would seem that this recent office updates have broken printing emails.

However, the most recent update today 15330.20266 seems to be resolving the issue on one of our machines. We are testing to verify if it resolves all of them.

Answer 1

Hi @A Childs ,
In order to further confirm your issue, could you print normally on other office client(such as Word and Excel)? If the issue only occurred when you print email on Outlook, did it occurred on any specific emails only? And could it be reproduced if you print a blank email?
If you could print the blank emails normally on your Outlook, the issue may be related to any specific messages, based on my research, I found a similar thread, which mentioned outlook may crash when you try to print a message with corrupted signature, it's suggested to check if it's also your case.(Please Note: Since the web site is not hosted by Microsoft, the link may change without notice. Microsoft does not guarantee the accuracy of this information.)

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Answer 2

We had hoped that updating to 15330.20266 released today would resolve the issue permanently. It does not. The issue still persists intermittently and Outlook misbehaves when trying to print. It appeared to temporarily resolve this issue for a short while on a few machines, but it was inconsistent. Further testing still comes up empty with regards to a fix.

Removing all installed printers will prevent outlook from freezing when you navigate to the print screen, but adding any printer back (print to PDF, network printer, local printer) will cause it to freeze again and stop working.