Outlook Desktop Notifications Not Working, But Enabled in Outlook and System Settings

Hi JackPiephoff, the fact that your 'Rules and Alerts' panel won't open is the 'smoking gun' here—it indicates that the local Outlook MAPI profile or the .ost data file is corrupted, which is why the notification service can't hook into the mail arrival event.

A reinstall won't fix this because it keeps your corrupted profile settings. Try these steps in order:

Repair the Data File: Run the SCANPST.EXE utility (located in your Office installation folder) on your .ost file to fix internal corruption.

Create a New Outlook Profile: This is the most reliable fix. Go to Control Panel > Mail (Microsoft Outlook) > Show Profiles > Add. Create a new profile and let Outlook re-download your mailbox. If notifications work here, the old profile was the culprit.

Check the 'Office Notification' Registry Key: Sometimes the registry flag for the notification listener gets stuck in a 'disabled' state. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Options\General and ensure ShowEnvelope is set to 1.

If the 'Rules and Alerts' window still refuses to open after creating a new profile, you likely have a conflict with an add-in. Try launching Outlook in safe mode (outlook.exe /safe) to see if the Rules menu becomes accessible.