Hotmail Sign in again: login sessions twice or in loop
Regardless of the web browser you are using to access your Hotmail emails, you have surely experienced the "Sign-out isn't complete... Finish signing out" error message. Though more rare, you will sometimes have the same type of problem when you try to access your emails (or another function in your Windows Live profile), and have to sign in to Hotmail again and again - twice, but sometimes even more, in what seems like an infinite loop! This tutorial explains the most common causes of this problem, and how to fix it so that Windows Live keeps you logged in - if you are using Hotmail outside your computer, make sure to always manually sign out of your email account when you are done, for security reasons.
Problem with Hotmail login looping several times
Here are some of the most common reasons for which you may find yourself trying to login to your email accounts multiple times, if only to have to re-enter your password. Note that all the issues-troubleshooting steps below assume that you check your Hotmail emails from a web browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox...) If you use an email program like Windows Live Mail, you'll get other types of errors.
- There are some cases in which it is completely normal that Windows Live Hotmail asks for your password even if you just logged into your email account; one such case is when you want to change Hotmail password, for example: as a security measure, you will be required to re-enter your password simply to prevent someone else from changing it without your knowledge or consent - if you left your computer unattended, or if you share your machine with others.
- This standard case out of the way, let's look at the top five issues that would cause a looping login session. All are advanced options, mostly beyond the scope of this tutorial; aside from the first one (connectivity), you may need to ask a nearby techie for help, as needed.
- Tip: If you know for a fact that no-one has customized your web browser settings, and if you haven't done it yourself, these options are automatically ruled out, since they are all configured correctly by default - in all web browsers, and all operating systems (Windows, Mac, Linux, etc.)
- Intermittent internet connection (and disconnection) - this is the simplest solution, and is fixed quite easily. As you may already know from our "Hotmail Login" tutorial, a "session" is created and maintained whenever you try to sign in, load different emails to read them, or access your account's options, for example. This is what allows Hotmail to "recognize" you as the same user as time passes; and problems with you wired or wireless internet connection will give you trouble with "session handling" - in effect, Hotmail is no longer sure if you are the same person, which is why it then asks you to log back in! (If you cannot improve or change internet connection, note that using Hotmail's automatic login option may help).
- Using a proxy - You normally connect directly to the internet, but if you have setup a proxy connection that regularly changes your "IP address", this will create problems with your login session. Try connecting without proxy, and you should no longer have to login to Hotmail over and over (and you can re-enable IP switching once you are done checking your emails).
- Cookies disabled - If you choose to automatically sign in to your Hotmail account, you will need to enable cookies; Hotmail may also give you error messages even after you have successfully logged in to your emails - just re-enable cookie support in your web browser.
- JavaScript disabled - An older version of Hotmail allowed you to connect to your emails with JavaScript disabled, with limited functionality. This is no longer the case, and nearly everything works with JavaScript and Ajax behind the scenes: re-enable JavaScript to fix login issues.
- Web page redirection disabled - As soon as you click on the "Sign in" button after having entered your "Windows Live ID" (email address) and password, Hotmail will use redirection to another page (either the Windows Live Home page or your inbox, depending on your current settings), so having disabled redirection of web pages will prevent you from automatically accessing your emails. Here too, redirection is enabled by default in all modern browsers, so you'll just need to re-enable it to be able to login to Hotmail without problems.
And there are the top five problems that force you to sign in to Hotmail again and again; if it happens only twice, and only occasionally, this may just be a hiccup you can disregard. If it happens in loop, even to the point of preventing you from accessing your email account, keep in mind that the problem may well be on the Windows Live mail servers themselves - in which case you should just wait 10 to 15 minutes.
New Hotmail, MSN Hotmail, Windows Live Hotmail & Live email are all referring to the same free webmail service offered by Microsoft and Windows Live Team (works on Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Mac OS X). Microsoft Corporation, Apple, and other companies own the copyright or trademark to these and other terms mentioned.