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SMS 19.1 displays "Loading packages.Please wait" but never installs.

John W 20 Reputation points
2023-08-20T00:27:39.25+00:00

SMS 19.1 displays "Loading packages.Please wait" and the blue bar continuously cycles but doesn't install. It is on Windows 11 on a individual desktop computer.

I have tried the recommended steps

  • Restart the computer after the failed installation of SSMS.
  • Temporarily disable any antivirus software and firewall, retry the installation.
  • Clean up the %temp% folder.
  • Make sure run the installer as administrator
SQL Server
SQL Server
A family of Microsoft relational database management and analysis systems for e-commerce, line-of-business, and data warehousing solutions.
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  1. Shivam Kumar 541 Reputation points
    2023-08-20T04:29:45.29+00:00

    Hi @John W could be stale registry issue caused by incomplete uninstallation of older ssms.

    Run from an elevated cmd prompt, then retry the installation:

    
reg DELETE “HKLM\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio” /reg:32

    Taken from:

    https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/sqlserver/en-US/88eac0f2-f97f-4e44-bb98-f8341dfe3bce/installing-ssms-18-won39t-go-past-quotloading-packagesquot-phase?forum=vssetup#:~:text=%20It%20seems%20the%20installation%20stuck%20on%20and,sure%20run%20the%20installer%20as%20administrator%20More%20

    2 people found this answer helpful.

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  1. Erland Sommarskog 107.1K Reputation points
    2023-08-20T12:20:26.1833333+00:00

    Unfortunately, issues when installing SSMS is not unheard of. SSMS is a very complex beast, making it a little brittle.

    If Shivam's suggestion does not work out (or any other trick you may find, )one option is to forget about SSMS and use Azure Data Studio instead. ADS is a more recent offering from Microsoft, and therefore has less of baggage. It does not have everything that SSMS has, but if all you want to do is to run queries, ADS should do just fine.

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  2. ZoeHui-MSFT 35,556 Reputation points
    2023-08-21T02:24:13.4866667+00:00

    Hi @John W，

    SSMS 19.1 is the latest general availability (GA) version. If you have a preview version of SSMS 19 installed, you should uninstall it before installing SSMS 19.1. If you have SSMS 19.x installed, installing SSMS 19.1 upgrades it to 19.1.

    Here is a same thread, you may take a reference to.

    Regards，

    Zoe Hui

    If the answer is helpful, please click "Accept Answer" and upvote it.

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