Why does it say something went wrong on Outlook?

If your Outlook returns a yellow box saying “Something went wrong and your search couldn’t be completed” the most likely issue is your Windows Search Service is damaged.

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Rename your account to something else
Set one of your other aliases as the primary alias
Add another alias to your account and make it the primary alias
Why does my Outlook say something went wrong and your search couldn't be completed?
Why does my Outlook account keep saying error?
Why can't I access my emails on Outlook?

You can verify this in two ways:

Click the START button and type something. If it shows SEARCH INDEXING WAS TURNED OFF. TURN INDEXING BACK ON, this is likely your issue
Click the START button and type SERVICES.MSC to start the Services management console and see if the WINDOWS SEARCH service is not running.

To fix this problem you should RIGHT click on the WINDOWS SEARCH service and select START. In the unlikely event that works, you are done, but most likely you will need to flush an rebuild the Windows Search service. The fastest way to solve this is to delete the Windows Search Service data and have it rebuild from scratch.

Click the START button and type SERVICES.MSC to start the Services management console
Double click on WINDOWS SEARCH and set it to DISABLED (as shown in the screen shot above)
1. Note that STOP will not do the trick, you must force it to DISABLE
Reboot
Delete all files from both:
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Search\Data\Applications\Windows C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Search\Data\Temp
1. These are hidden files, so be sure that hidden files are made visible
Click the START button and type SERVICES.MSC to start the Services management console
Double click on WINDOWS SEARCH and set it to AUTOMATIC – DELAYED START
Either reboot or manually start the WINDOWS SEARCH service

As this point all search indexes have been removed and will take time to rebuild. Outlook, in particular, will only rebuild it’s index when it is running so make sure you leave Outlook up for a few hours. You can tell it is working because when you do a search in Outlook it will have a ‘we’re indexing right now, try again later’ type message and not the yellow bar ‘Something Went Wrong…’ message.

If you are adventurous you can also try to force the start from the command line. If the Search Service has corrupted data, you will see SERVICE SPECIFIC ERROR 2147750271 if you try to start the WINDOWS SEARCH service from a CMD line (NET START “WINDOWS SEARCH”).

This can be a tedious process if you are just trying to complete homework and need to find some old content. Some will give up and same it is DomyEssay for me .

So you have a new computer, setting up a fresh copy of Office, and you go to login to the users email for the first time and get this lovely little error:

“Something went wrong”
Something went wrong and Outlook couldn’t set up your account. Please
Try again. If the problem continues, contact your email administrator.

Whats most frustrating about this for me is, each time I had it happen it was with a user account that was getting a new computer, but had been working perfectly fine on the old system prior. I had come across a lot of suggested fixes that may work, but didn’t resolve my issue:

Resolution 1 (Didn’t work for me) : Make sure office and windows are up-to-date.

Resolution 2 (Didn’t work for me) : Disable IPV6 ( tools for disabling ipv6 here )

Resolution 3 (Didn’t work for me) : Try the 64 bit version of the installer

Resolution 4 (WORKED FOR ME!) : So – in my case, it turns out there were some DNS entry records that dissipated (thanks 3rd party web guy!) that messed up auto discovery. This resolution includes a diagnostic step, a permanent fix, and a work around to get your user up and running on mail fast.

Step 1 : Check if DNS is broken. Use the microsoft tools and these instructions to diagnose your DNS and make any recommended changes : https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2776497/the-office-365-dns-diagnostic-and-dns-configuration

Step 2 : Registry edits, this will get your user up and running right now without waiting for your DNS changes to take effect – editing your registry is dangerous, if your not sure of what your doing – talk to a pro. </disclaimer>

Open regedit as an Administrator and add the following registry keys (All are 32 bit DWORD’s with a value of 1)

You might see this error if your primary alias's name is the same as an existing work or school account in Microsoft 365 or Azure Active directory. To resolve this error, try any of these steps:

Rename your account to something else

Changing the name of your account might fix the issue.

Sign in to the Your Info page of your Microsoft account.
Select Manage how you sign in to Microsoft.
Look under the Account aliases section.
- If you already have a personal email address listed there, you can skip this step.
- If your work or school email address is the only one listed, enter your personal email address or get a new one from Microsoft, and select Add alias.
If your personal email address does not have (primary alias) listed next to it, select Make primary to set it as your primary alias.
Select Remove next to your work email address to remove it from your account.

For more information on how to do this, go to Rename your personal account.

Set one of your other aliases as the primary alias

If you have more than one alias, try setting another alias as the primary alias.

Sign in to the Microsoft account website and enter any additional security information required.
Select Your info.
Select Manage how you sign in to Microsoft.
Select Make primary next to the alias you want as your primary.

For more information on how to do this, go to Manage aliases on your Microsoft account.

Add another alias to your account and make it the primary alias

If you have only one alias, or your other aliases don't work, try adding another alias to your account and making it the primary alias.

Note: You cannot add an alias that is already associated with another Microsoft account. Aliases cannot be used to share information between two Microsoft accounts. Existing @hotmail.com, @live.com, @outlook.com, and @msn.com addresses can't be added as aliases.

Sign in to the Microsoft account website and enter any additional security information required.
Select Your info.
Select Manage how you sign in to Microsoft.
Select Add email or Add phone number.
Follow the instructions to set up and verify your new alias. If you chose Add email, you have the option to use an email address that you already have, or you can create a new Outlook.com email address.

Why does my Outlook say something went wrong and your search couldn't be completed?

Cause. This is a known limitation of the Exchange Online search service. The issue occurs if an Outlook client uses the primary mailbox user's credentials to run a search from a secondary mailbox.

Why does my Outlook account keep saying error?

Generally a corrupted PST file is considered the main cause behind most of the common Outlook error messages. Although Microsoft provides the Inbox Repair tool to repair PST file, it may fail or not work in a case of severe corruption.

Why can't I access my emails on Outlook?

Check your Internet connection on your device. Check for any web browser updates on your device. Reinstall web browsers onto your device to ensure that you have the most updated ones. Check to see if your computer/device has any pending or important updates to run overall.