When trying to preview attachments in Microsoft Outlook, you may receive a message that says “This file cannot be previewed because there is no previewer installed for it.” Here’s how you can fix this in most cases.
Fix 1 – Ensure Application is Installed
Ensure that the application used to open the file is installed. Excel for spreadsheets, Word for documents, and Adobe Reader for PDF files.
Fix 2 – Check Attachment Handling Settings
- In Outlook, go to “File” > “Options” > “Trust Center” > “Trust Center Settings…” > “Attachment Handling“.
- Ensure that “Turn off Attachment Preview” is NOT checked.
- Select the “Attachment and Document Previewers…” button.
- Make sure that the previewer you wish to use is checked, then select “OK” three times.
Fix 3 – Windows Registry Settings
There is commonly a problemwhere Windowsis not configured to let Outlook preview Microsoft Office files such as Word, Excel, Visio, and PowerPoint files. Follow these steps to fix it.
- DownloadPreviewFix.zip.
- Open the file and double-click“PreviewFix.reg“.
- When prompted, select “Yes” to import the file into the registry.
Try to preview an Office file from Outlook now.
Fix 4 – Enable Windows Firewall
This is a strange one. But some user have reported that enabling the Windows Firewall fixes their issue. Follow these steps to ensure it’s on.
- Select the “Start” button, then select “Settings“.
- Navigate to “Update & Security” > “Windows Security” > “Firewall & network protection“.
- Choose a network profile, and then under “Windows Defender Firewall“, turn the setting to “On“.
Fix 5 – PDF Registry Fix
This fix is for users of 64 bit versions of Windows experiencing problems with previewing PDF files in Outlook.
- Select the “Start” button, then type “regedit“.
- Select and open the Registry Editor.
- Navigate to the following location:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Wow6432Node \ Classes \ CLSID \ {DC6EFB56-9CFA-464D-8880-44885D7DC193} - Open “AppID“.
- Change the “Value Data” to the following, then select “OK“:
{534A1E02-D58F-44f0-B58B-36CBED287C7C}
Do you have any tricks for fixing the“This file cannot be previewed because there is no previewer installed for it.” message? Share them in the comments section.
The issue is: Outlook 2013 simply will not give a preview of Word [nor Excel] docs in attachments.
Never had the issue with Outlook 2010. Using Outlook 2013 on Windows 7 64bit SSD with Word 2010.
I did notice that "Microsoft Word" is not listed specifically in Trust Center attachment handling, could that be part of the problem? Excel, Visio, RTF and many more are there.
Update: strange, search can be performed in Word attachments... but can't preview Word file. So, Outlook can 'see' Word docs but won't let us have that preview.
For reference, here is a similar question I posted in the Microsoft Answers forum.
Trying to preview word attachments in Outlook 2016 and getting the following error message?
“This file cannot be previewed because of an error with the following previewer: Microsoft Word previewer ”
I was too and here’s how I fixed it for me.
1. Open word and click on File.
2. Click Options from the menu
3. Click Trust Center then Trust Center Settings.
4. Untick ‘Enable Protected View for Outlook attachments’
5. Log out and log back in [This wont work until you do this!]
Hi Seng55,
Thank you for posting your concern here in the Microsoft Community Forum.
We understand that you are getting an error message that says “This file can't be previewed because of an error in Microsoft word previewer" whenever you downloaded and selected always keep on your device for your files and folders. Let us work together to sort this out.
This may be an application-related concern and it seems the issue is also related to this article: "This file can't be previewed" error in Word, Excel, or PowerPoint.
At this point, let’s troubleshoot the Word application by performing each method below:
Method 1: Let us try launching your Outlook app in safe mode. Here is a link: Open Outlook in safe mode for the steps to do so. Doing so should help us in determining if this is an add-in-related issue.
If the issue doesn’t appear while the app is in safe mode, then an add-in is likely causing it. To disable add-ins, please access this article: View, manage, and install add-ins in Office programs and follow the steps under Permanently disable or remove an add-in section. The procedures provided to disable add-in apply to all Office applications.
Method 2: Install Office Update. This process is to ensure that you’ll get access to the newest features and benefit from the latest security updates. Please follow the steps below on how to do this accordingly:
Open any Office apps.
Click on File.
Go to Account.
Under Product Information, choose Update Options and click Update Now.
Once the updates are completely installed, relaunch the application, and see if the problem occurs.
Method 3: We advise that you perform an Online Repair for your Office program in resolving problems with the features and performance of the Outlook application. Here are the steps:
Right-click the Start button [lower-left corner].
Select Apps and Features.
Right-click your Microsoft Office suite or Office 365 and click Change, and then choose Online Repair.
Click Repair and follow the on-screen instruction to continue. Restart your device and check if the issue will be resolved.
Using the above instructions, we can isolate the concern further and resolve the application-related concern at the same time.
We hope these info help. Please don’t hesitate to reach back to us if you need additional assistance.
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