Solved! Windows 11 Microsoft Photos app won't launch or respond

After performing a Windows Update or updating a Microsoft Store app, the Microsoft Photos app may not start or may become unresponsive.

Yesterday, in my environment, I had the image file association set to "Photos," but when I double-clicked an image file, the image did not open, and when I ran the "Photos" app directly, it did not respond.

After some research, I found that some people have been unable to launch the Photos app after installing KB5037771, which was released on May 14, 2024. (I have already installed it.)

Here I will introduce the methods I tried and the solutions I found.

Methods tried

1. Uninstall KB5037771
2. Repair and reset the app
3. Uninstall the app and then reinstall it from the Microsoft Store
4. What to do if Windows Store apps won't start on Win10/Win11

1, 2, and 3 have no effect at all, and the Photos app cannot be launched.

When I tried to get version 4 from the Microsoft Store, I got the message "There was a problem on the server side."

When I looked at the error details, it said, "Please wait a few minutes. The update wasn't downloaded. Please try again later (typo) Code: 0x80246007."

After that, I restored the files I had deleted (and saved) in step 4 and tried to install the Photos app using a command, but it still did not respond.

How to remove and install Windows Store apps using commands on Win10/Win11

How I solved it

I gave up because I couldn't find a solution. Windows フォトビューアーI thought I'd use .

That reminded me of the following page:

Win11 Windows security is blank and restricted by IT administrator.

I think this is probably a problem on Microsoft's side, but some applications cannot be run unless you "run as administrator." (They don't respond.)

So I right-clicked on "Photos" in the Start menu and clicked "Run as administrator," and the "Photos" app started up successfully.

We suspect that at some point changes were made to the settings files or registry values ​​related to the Photos app.

Once you have started it, you will no longer need to "run as administrator" and will be able to start it normally.

If you associate the photo file with the Photos app, you can open it by double-clicking it.

I want to read it together

How to reset file associations to default in Win11 This time, we will show you how to restore the default file associations in Windows 11. For example, files with the extension ".png" are normally associated with "Photos," but if you manually...

On July 12, 2024, Microsoft added a temporary workaround for the issue where the Photos app cannot be launched.

I want to read it together

Microsoft acknowledges bug that prevents Windows 11 Photos app from launching Microsoft has announced that if you updated the Microsoft Photos app from the Microsoft Store on or after June 4, 2024 (version 2024.11050.29009.0 or later), the Photos app will no longer rotate when launched.