This holds true for virtually any application, not just Office.

if an older version of Office is uninstalled after the current version is installed, a full repair of the current version of Office should be done.

Office ‘2013/’2016 will migrate the old profiles for use in ‘2013/’2016 The Outlook profiles for the older version will not be removed.

unless there is any real pressing reason to retain an older version of Office on the computer, this should be removed prior to installing the current version.

uninstall any trial version of Office that came with the computer before installing a purchased version.

uninstalling a trial version of Office after installing a purchased version – either by subscription or perpetual license.

removing Office ‘2010 after installing ‘2016)

uninstalling an earlier version of Office after installing a later version (i.e.

errors occurring in specific functions within Outloo.

However, there certainly are times when either an uninstall/reinstall or Office repair is in order. See: How to Start Outlook as a Fresh New Install In this scenario, creating a new Outlook profile is the equivalent of starting as if it was the first time Outlook is being used.

If the issue being encountered is email account related, then it may well be the result of the default Outlook profile getting corrupted, in which case the solution would be to create a new Outlook profile, configuring the email accounts and setting the newly created profile as the default for the next time Outlook is opened. To put this another way, when Office is reinstalled, Outlook will continue to use the existing Outlook profiles. When Office/Outlook is uninstalled using Control Panel, the existing Outlook profiles are not removed and persist. In terms of correcting errors occurring within Outlook, there are times when performing an uninstall/reinstall serves no purpose and is a complete waste of time.

Microsoft 365 removal tool