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

A Childs 156

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

====================================

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.

Accepted answer

Faery Fu-MSFT 17,021 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2022-07-22T00:28:08.357+00:00

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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A Childs 156 Reputation points

2022-07-22T13:58:27.677+00:00

Resolution: Broken Signatures Causing Print Issues

Thank you @Faery Fu-MSFT , it looks like there were a couple contributing factors here. There was an Office patch that came out yesterday which fixed part of the issue, and our firewall was blocking a website where the email signature images are stored. Creating an exception for this rule repaired the broken signature and resolved the printing issues. We are verifying with users, but it seems to be resolved now.

Thank you for pointing us in this direction. We are adding documentation on our end to ensure that something like this does not happen again.

A few notes based on our testing:
As best we can tell, previous builds of office (ie. 15330.20230) did not have the printing issue at all. The newer builds (15330.20246 and 15330.20264) had the issue regardless of what email was trying to print, the newest build 15330.20266 only had the issue with emails missing the outlook signature.

Fixing the broken outlook signature appears to have resolved any remaining issues.

Faery Fu-MSFT 17,021 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2022-07-23T17:54:21.783+00:00

Hi @A Childs ,
Glad that your issue has been resolved and thanks for your sharing.
Have a good day!
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5 additional answers

Chris Addeo 5 Reputation points

2023-07-15T13:41:57.0166667+00:00
This worked for a machine I was recently troubleshooting:

Stop Outlook

Delete, copy or move the old OutlPrnt file. OutlPrnt is located at: C:\Users%username%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Outlook\OutlPrnt

Restart Outlook

Hope it works for you.
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1 person found this answer helpful.
Thomas 0 Reputation points

2023-08-11T13:52:19.8866667+00:00

We're experiencing a similar issue. The problem we're facing, however, is that the OutlPrnt file does not exist C:\Users%username%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Outlook or %appdata%\Microsoft\Outlook (same locations just shorter path).

Chris Addeo 5 Reputation points

2023-08-11T13:59:26.9333333+00:00

Hmm, that's strange, then again I only had this issue and resolution on one machine. Have you tried ensuring all hidden files are viewable? Perhaps even searching on the file name?

Thomas 0 Reputation points

2023-08-11T14:31:16.3566667+00:00

Actually, after digging deeper into the comments of this thread, A. Child's resolved our issue:

The OutlPrnt file will store user print settings from outlook only after they have selected the "Print Options" button noted below. For individuals using outlook for the first time, or who have deleted the OutlPrnt file, it will not appear unless they actually click the "Print Options" button. Therefore, if you are using Outlook with default print settings and not actually changing any of the options, a user will not have the OutlPrnt file in their app data folder.

Yesterday was the first time one of my users, as well as myself, have experienced the Outlook crashing when printing issue, so now I'm curious to what may have initiated the issue.

Chris Addeo 5 Reputation points

2023-08-11T14:58:12.3433333+00:00

Nice! Thanks A. Child! I can't say why this started or is happening. We have about 100 systems, this is this only happened to one of our users. Seems rather rare.

aenagy ncsl.biz 0 Reputation points

2023-10-11T18:16:39.3566667+00:00

Deleting file "%UserProfile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Outlook\OutlPrnt.*" fixed my problem.
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