Outlook Classic Issues composing an email

Jimmy Cavero 20 Reputation points
2026-01-07T16:11:35.82+00:00

Hello,

  • There are two issues with composing an email in Outlook Classic.
  1. When hitting the "Enter" key twice to start a new paragraph, the font changes to a Heading style. A workaround I found was to hit "Shift + Enter".
    Here sharing a short video: https://www.loom.com/share/55b46ce42490480cb59b8a5d89d61603
  2. Erratic behavior when typing, for e.g., I've, it changes to I'vet after hitting the space bar. This happens with You've or some other characters.

This is what was done, but it didn't fix the problem:

  • Created a new Outlook Profile.
  • Ran an Online Repair
  • The Outlook version is the latest, but when comparing it with another Windows computer, it doesn't look the same. There've been old versions installed on this machine. I can see records of previous installations in %appdata%.
  • Recreate the normal.dotm, deleted templates.
  • Removed some registry records for MailSettings
  • There are only two add-ins: Adobe and another for daily backup. Categories: ReliefJet.
  • Plus other troubleshooting steps, I don't recall them at this moment.

Hope someone may encounter similar issues. The last resort would be deleting all the previous records from the Office using a software removal and trying to download the latest version, but I wanted to give it another shot.

Outlook | Windows | Classic Outlook for Windows | For business
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Answer accepted by question author
Anonymous
2026-01-08T00:40:32.91+00:00

Hi Jimmy Cavero, 

Welcome to Microsoft Q&A Forum! Have a good day and I hope you're doing well!  

Thank you for sharing the details of your situation. I understand how frustrating it can be to experience issues when composing emails in Outlook, especially after you’ve already tried several troubleshooting steps. 

Based on my research, the behavior you described often stems from a few underlying causes such as: Office registry entries becoming cluttered or overlapping due to multiple previous installations; Normal.dotm and NormalEmail.dotm templates being corrupted or overwritten by older versions; and AutoCorrect lists (.acl) along with related settings becoming damaged or misconfigured. 

You mentioned there are two add-ins. To rule out this as a cause, have you tried running Outlook in Safe Mode? (Press Windows + R, type outlook.exe /safe, and hit Enter) 

If the issue does not occur in Safe Mode, the problem may be related to one of the add-ins. 

Next steps I recommend: 

1. Close Outlook completely, then delete or rename the following files: 

%appdata%\Microsoft\Templates\Normal.dotm 

%appdata%\Microsoft\Templates\NormalEmail.dotm 

2. Clear the AutoCorrect list:  

  • Navigate to: %appdata%\Microsoft\Office\ 
  • Delete the file MSO1033.acl (or MSOxxxx.acl depending on your language). 

If the above steps still don’t resolve the issue, I believe the best approach would be to completely refresh the installation. You can use the Office Removal Tool to remove all remnants of previous versions. After that, download and install the latest version of Office. 

I hope this information gives you some additional insights, even if only partially. If you have any questions, concerns, or if I misunderstood or wasn’t clear on any point, please feel free to let me know so we can work through this together. 

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.  

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  1. AI answer

    2026-01-07T16:11:51.46+00:00

    When composing emails in Outlook Classic, the issues you are experiencing can be frustrating. Here are some insights based on common troubleshooting steps:

    1. Font Changing to Heading Style: The behavior of the font changing to a Heading style when pressing "Enter" twice can sometimes be related to the default formatting settings in Outlook. Using "Shift + Enter" is indeed a common workaround to insert a line break without changing the style. You might also want to check your default font settings and paragraph formatting to ensure they are set correctly.
    2. Erratic Typing Behavior: The issue where typing results in unexpected characters (like "I'vet") could be due to a few factors:
      • Add-ins: Even though you have only two add-ins, they could still interfere with normal typing behavior. Consider disabling them temporarily to see if the issue persists.
      • Corrupted User Profile: While you created a new profile, ensure that the old profile is completely removed to avoid any conflicts.
      • Registry Issues: Since you've already removed some registry records, ensure that any remaining settings that might affect typing are also cleared.
      • Previous Installations: The presence of old versions in your %appdata% could potentially cause conflicts. A clean uninstall of Office, followed by a fresh installation, may help resolve these lingering issues.

    Since you've already performed several troubleshooting steps, if these issues continue, a complete removal of Office and reinstallation might be necessary as a last resort. This can help ensure that all previous settings and configurations are cleared out completely.

    References:

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