Windows 10 Microsoft Account Sign-In Issues

Hello Yangyang Zhao,

Welcome to Microsoft Q&A forum.

Please understand that our forum is a public platform, and we will modify your question to cover your personal information in the description. Please notice to hide these personal or organization information next time you post error or some information to protect personal data.

This error usually means that the services that you are trying to start close unexpectantly. Before we proceed, may I have a photo of the whole error message to check it better? Please remember to remove all personal information before posting.

In the meantime, here is a quick fix you can try:

• Press Win + R and type services.msc in the dialog box, then press Enter.
• Find and double-click on Microsoft Account Sign-in Assistant.
• Change it startup type to Manual and click Apply.
• Right click on the service and Select "Start", or restart it if it is already running.

If the answer is helpful, please click "Accept Answer" and kindly upvote it. If you have extra questions about this answer, please click "Comment".

Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.

Follow these steps on Windows 10 to troubleshoot Microsoft account sign-in issues affecting Office, Mail, and other apps:

1. Check basic Windows sign-in and account health

• If there are problems signing into Windows itself (profile errors, password/PIN issues), use the Windows sign-in troubleshooting entry point and follow the relevant flows for:
  • Corrupted user profile
  • PIN problems
  • Password reset or Microsoft account password issues These are linked from the Windows sign-in troubleshooting article.

2. Verify network and security software

• Ensure the device has a stable internet connection.
• Confirm that local firewall, antivirus, or security software is not blocking Microsoft sign-in endpoints or token processes. For Office sign-in in particular, make sure:
  • Microsoft.AAD.BrokerPlugin.exe and backgroundTaskHost.exe are not blocked by firewall/AV.
  • The network does not block https://login.microsoftonline.com. Blocking these can cause repeated credential prompts or sign-in failures across Office and other Microsoft apps.

3. Update Windows 10 and Office

• Install the latest Windows 10 updates (aim for Windows 10, version 22H2).
• Update Microsoft 365/Office apps to the latest build for the configured update channel. Newer builds contain fixes for authentication and Web Account Manager (WAM) issues.

4. Clear cached credentials

• Open Credential Manager in Control Panel.
• Under Windows Credentials and Generic Credentials, remove saved entries related to Microsoft 365, Office, or work/school/Microsoft accounts.
• Sign in again when prompted.

5. Check Mail and Calendar app specifics (if Mail is failing)

• If Mail shows “Your account settings are out of date”:
  • In the notification bar in Mail, select Fix account and re-enter the correct password.
  • If a certificate error appears, open Manage Accounts → select the account → Change mailbox sync settings → Advanced mailbox settings and:
    • Confirm incoming/outgoing server names and ports.
    • Enable Require SSL for incoming email and Require SSL for outgoing email, then Done → Save.
• If the email account uses two-factor authentication and Mail/Calendar cannot sign in:
  • Create an app password with the email provider and use that app password in Mail instead of the normal password, because Mail and Calendar on Windows 10 do not support two-factor authentication directly.

6. Check device and token-related issues (for Office and Microsoft 365 apps) If Office apps repeatedly prompt for credentials or fail to sign in:

• Ensure the device is healthy from an Azure AD / Microsoft Entra perspective:
  • If the device is disabled in Microsoft Entra ID or on-premises Active Directory, an administrator must re-enable it.
  • If the device object was deleted or is not authenticated, follow the manual recovery method appropriate to how the device is joined (Microsoft Entra hybrid join, Add a work account, or Microsoft Entra join) using dsregcmd /status and dsregcmd /leave as documented.
• Check for TPM-related errors in Event Viewer under Applications and Services Logs → Microsoft → Windows → AAD → Operational. If TPM errors with patterns like 0x?028???? or 0x?029???? appear, update TPM firmware and let Windows complete the automatic or manual recovery process.

7. Use automated sign-in troubleshooting for Office

• Run the Microsoft 365 Sign-in troubleshooter to automatically diagnose and fix common Office sign-in issues.

8. If all Microsoft accounts are affected across the device

• After completing the steps above (updates, network checks, credential clearing, device/TPM checks), if every Microsoft account still fails on that device while working elsewhere, this strongly suggests a device registration or token-broker problem. In that case:
  • Verify device join status with dsregcmd /status.
  • If the device is Microsoft Entra hybrid joined or workplace joined and appears corrupted, use dsregcmd /leave, restart, and rejoin/reconnect to work or school.
  • If the device is managed by an organization, escalate to the tenant administrator to check device status in Microsoft Entra ID and to review sign-in logs for the correlation ID and error code.

References:

• Resolve sync issues in Mail and Calendar apps in Windows 10
• Troubleshoot Problems Signing In to Windows
• Connection issues when signing in after updating to Office 2016 build 16.0.7967 on Windows 10