Experiencing issues logging in to your user profile in Windows 10? If you are getting the following error, then you are dealing with a corrupted user profile in Windows 10:
The User Profile Service Failed The Logon
User Profile Cannot Be Loaded
Many reasons have been speculated to cause this issue, and it is not exclusive to Windows 10. Corrupted User Profile error has been reported by many users since the time of Windows 7, Vista, as well as Windows 8. So, what are the main reasons that may cause The User Profile Service Failed The Logon issue?
A failed Windows update that includes the update of Windows system files that are very critical is one of the main reasons to trigger User Profile Cannot Be Loaded error. Also, when you try to switch user profiles in Windows while an Antivirus or Antimalware scan is running, it could corrupt user profile easily. A damaged or corrupt hard disk could also be a reason for this error to show up. There could be several other reasons as well, but let’s just skip that try to find a solution to this problem.
How To Fix Corrupted User Profile in Windows 10
There are various ways to tackle this issue. If the “The User Profile Service Failed The Logon, User Profile Cannot Be Loaded” error has occurred just once, then you can try to restart your PC and try to log in once again. In some cases, you will be able to log in, and in some cases, you won’t be able to. If you are able to log in and error doesn’t bother you again, then you are good to go. But, if the error shows up again, you will have to follow the methods mentioned below to fix it. And, to carry out all of these methods, you will need to be logged in to your PC.
In case, you are not able to log in with your user profile, then you can try to get into Windows with either of the following two ways:
a) Log in through another user account that has admin rights.
b) Boot Windows in the Safe Mode if you do not have any other user account.
Well, logging in with another user account is easy. And, in case, you do not know how to boot PC in safe mode, simply press the F8 button repeatedly with a 1-second gap when you start/restart your PC, till you get the Advanced Boot Options screen. From the boot options, navigate to Safe Mode option through your keyboard, then press the Enter key. This will log your computer in Safe Mode with Admin privileges.
Now, do not proceed with the methods yet to fix corrupted user profile Windows 10 error. You will need to create a backup of files that are available on Hard Disk and are user specific just to your user profile.
Create Backup
If you take backup of your files regularly, then you are all set and directly skip from here to Method #1. In case, you do not have the habit of backup, the best bet for you is to remove the hard disk from your PC and connect it to another PC / laptop via. USB and backup the data. You can do so with the help of a Hard Drive Enclosure or a Hard Drive USB Adapter. Both of these tools would be easily available online or on any computer store.
If you have no idea what you are dealing with here, then you should get help from someone who knows how to.
Once, you have this hard drive data backup part taken care of, you will need to try out the following methods, starting with Method #1.
#1 – Copy the ‘Default’ folder from another computer-
Copying the default folder from a normal Windows 10 computer and pasting it in the faulty computer’s directory will surely fix this issue-
Prerequisites–
Before going ahead you will need a working Windows 10 system with following features-
a. Both of the Windows 10 computers (your system and the working computer) should be of same Windows type (Pro or Home, Single Language or Education, but same).
b. Both of the Windows should be of same architecture type (32-bit or 64-bit).
c. A pen drive.
When you have a working Windows 10 system which fulfill both of the requirements, follow these steps-
Steps to perform in the working Windows 10 computer-
1. Press Windows key+E to open File Explorer on your computer.
2. In File Explorer window, click on the left hand side click on “Local Disk (C:)“.
3. On the right hand side, scroll down and double click on “Users” folder.
4. In Users folder, click on “View” of menu-bar.
5. Now, check the option “Hidden items” to see the hidden items of the folder.
6. Right click on “Default” folder and then click on “Copy” to copy the folder.
7. Now, plug in the pen drive to this computer.
8. On the left hand side, click on “This PC” to visualize all the drives at once.
9. Now, double click on “USB Drive” to access it.
10. Now, in the usb drive, press ‘Ctrl + V‘ together from your keyboard to paste the ‘Default‘ folder in the usb drive.
After pasting the folder, eject the usb out of the computer.
Steps to perform on your computer-
Follow these easy steps to copy-paste the ‘Default‘ folder from this usb device on your computer.
1. Connect the pen drive to your computer.
2. Press Windows key+E to open File Explorer window.
3.On the left hand side, click on “This PC” to visualize all the drives at once. Now, double click on “USB Drive” to access it.
4. Now, right click on “Default” folder and then click on “copy” to copy it.
5. Same way as before, on the left hand side click on “Local Disk (C:)“.
6. On the right hand side, scroll down and double click on “Users” folder.
7. In Users folder, click on “View” of menu-bar.
8. Now, check the option “Hidden items” to see the hidden items of the folder.
9. Now, right click on “Default” and then click on “Rename“.
10. Name the folder as “Default.old“.
11. Finally, press ‘Ctrl+V‘ together to paste the copied ‘Default‘ folder.
Close File Explorer window.
That will fix the issue. Log out from your computer and then log in with the new account.
Your problem will be solved.
#2 – Use Windows Registry to Fix The User Profile Service Failed The Logon error
Using Windows Registry Editor, you can fix a corrupted user profile easily. Although there are risks involved of user data getting lost, creating a Registry backup will get you covered. So, the workflow would be to take a registry backup, then fix corrupted user profile Windows 10 error. Follow these steps to backup Registry, then fix user profile:
If you are unable to boot, Please follow the Method 3 of this article to go to safe mode
Step 1: Boot your PC in Safe Mode, as shown above.
Step 2: When in Safe Mode, press Windows + R keys together to open the Run box. In the Run box, type regedit and press Enter on your keyboard.
Step 2: This will open the Windows Registry Editor window. There, go to the File menu and click on the Export option. Now, export and save the backup of Registry somewhere on your PC.
Step 3: Once the backup is complete, you will have to navigate to the following path in Registry Editor from the panel at the left:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList
Once you are in the ProfileList section, you will find folders starting with the name S-1-5. Start looking in these folders from the folder at the bottom. To do that, select a folder, and look at the options that appear in the right panel. These options show up with Name, Type, and Data. Check out the Data section of the file named ProfileImagePath.
If the Data section is associated with your User Profile name, then that would be your User Profile key. If the Data section doesn’t have the name of your User Profile, the go look inside another S-1-5 folder.
Note: If a profile folder has .bak or .ba added after their name, then, you will have to rename it first before you go on and check for username association.
Step 4: After locating your corrupt user profile in Regedit, click on the RefCount option in the right panel. This will open an edit box, where, you have to set the Value data to 0 (zero), then click Ok.
If RefCount option is not available, double-click on the State option, and set its Value data to 0 (zero) and click the Ok button.
After changing these values in Registry Editor, close the window and then Restart your PC. This time, start your PC in normal mode and try to login with your usual User ID. If you did not get The User Profile Service Failed The Logon, User Profile Cannot Be Loaded error, this means your corrupted user profile issue has been fixed. If this method didn’t work for you and still getting the error, then you must try the next method.
#3 – Create A New User Profile
If the process of fixing user profile through Windows Registry Editor didn’t work, that means that you have a very badly corrupted user profile. In this case, what you can try to do is, create a new user profile, then transfer user data from the corrupt profile to the new one.
If you have another user profile with admin rights on the same PC, then you can begin creating a new user profile right away (skip to Step 1). In case, you do not have any such user account, what you will have to do is, activate the Hidden Admin Account that every Windows has. To activate it, you will have to boot your PC in Safe Mode first. To run PC in Safe Mode, follow the instructions as provided in the “How To Fix Corrupted User Profile in Windows 10” section above.
Activating Hidden Admin Account
Once you are in Safe Mode, open the Command Prompt in Admin mode. For this, open the Start menu, and type CMD in the Start search bar. From the search result, right click on the Command Prompt option, then click on Run as Administrator option from the right-click menu.
When the Command Prompt opens in Admin mode, type the following command in it and press Enter button:
net user administrator /active:yes
Once the command is run successfully, it would be the time to Restart your PC in normal mode and take a stab at fixing “The User Profile Service Failed The Logon, User Profile Cannot Be Loaded” error.
The Administrator login option will appear on the login screen after the boot. Now login with the Admin ID and follow these steps to create a new user account:
Step 1: Open the Start menu by clicking on the Start button, then type add user in the Start search bar. In the search result, select the Add, edit, or remove other people option.
Step 2: A new windows will open. There, go to the Family & other people section, then select the Add someone else to this PC option.
Step 3: In the next step, select the I don’t have this person’s sign-in information option.
Step 4: Now, click on the Add a user without a Microsoft account option.
Step 5: The wizard will now ask you to add the username, password, and a password hint of the new user account. After adding that information, click on the Next button.
These steps will create a new user account on your PC. The next step will be to transfer the recoverable and backup data from your old account to the new account.
Transfer Data from Old to New User Account
In this process, we access your old user account data from the already open Admin account, copy it, and move it to the new user account. For this, follow these steps:
Step 1: Open the This PC (My Computer) window from its icon available on the Desktop. Here, go to the C Drive.
Step 2: In C Drive, go to Users folder, where you have to find the folder of your old user profile. When found, double-click to open it.
Step 3: Now open the folders, such as Desktop, Documents, etc. in your old profile, and move the required data from that profile to the new user profile. You will find the folder associated to the new User profile in the Users folder as mentioned in Step 2. Try to copy only one folder at a time.
Step 4: Once this copying is done, log out of the Admin User ID and log in with the new ID. You can do that by pressing this button and selecting the new user ID, then entering the password that you set.
Step 5: When you are logged in with the new account, check if all your files have been successfully copied or not. If you find something missing, you can get it from the backup that you created from your hard disk in another PC (refer to Create Backup section).
The process is a lengthy one and might consume some good amount of time. If you want to try some quick fixes, you can try the methods mentioned below as well.
#4 – Run SFC Scan to fix The User Profile Service Failed The Logon Error
An SFC scan is Windows’ inbuilt tool that scans through system files of your PC and if a corrupt or broken file is found, it fixes them for you. It can also help at times to fix corrupted user profile Windows 10 error on your PC. You can either run this tool in Safe Mode or while logged in through Administrator user profile. Steps to run PC in both these modes are mentioned above in the article. Follow these steps to carry out an SFC Scan:
Step 1: Open Command Prompt in Admin mode. For this, press the Windows + X keys together on your keyboard and open the Win+X menu. Select the Command Prompt (Admin) option from this menu to run Command Prompt in Admin mode. You will get a prompt to allow Windows 10 to open Command Prompt in Admin mode. Click on Yes to allow.
Step 2: In the Command Prompt window, type the command given below and press Enter key:
sfc /scannow
Wait till the scan is completely over. This scan may take some time to finish, so do not interrupt the scan in between. When the scan completes, restart your PC and try to login with your original User Id and password. If you are not able to try the next method out.
#5 – Do A DISM Scan to fix User Profile Cannot Be Loaded Windows 10 error
At times, the SFC scan is not able to fix some corrupt files on your PC. You can run a DISM or Deployment Image & Servicing Management Scan to fix this. What it does is, it repairs the corrupt files which are responsible for a SFC scan that was incomplete.
In order to run DISM scan to fix corrupt user profile in Windows 10, open Command Prompt in admin mode as mentioned in the above method.
Now, in the open Command Prompt, type the following piece of command:
DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
Wait till the DISM scan is complete. Once the scan is over, re-run the SFC scan as I have explained in Method #3.
After the SFC scan is complete, restart your computer. Now try to login with your original user ID. Still getting The User Profile Service Failed The Logon Windows 10 error? Check out the next method that could do the trick for you.
#6 – Update Windows 10
If you leave your Windows 10 un-updated, or if a Windows 10 update remains incomplete, then issue of corrupted user profile may strike you. So, it is important that you keep your Windows updated. Here are the steps you can take to update your Windows 10.
Step 1: Log in to Windows through the Administrator login. Refer to Activating Hidden Admin Account section of Method 2.
Step 2: Open the Start menu and click on the Settings option.
Step 3: In the Settings window, click on the Update and Security option.
Step 4: This will open the Update & Security window. Here, go to the Windows Update section from the left panel. Under the Windows Update section, look for the Check For Updates button in the right panel. Windows with start looking for new Windows update if available. If an update is available, complete the update by following the update wizard’s instructions.
After the Windows 10 update is successfully done, it will restart your computer. Now, try to login with your original user ID.
If updating Windows didn’t work, you can try this one last method. Here, you reset Windows 10 to fix The User Profile Service Failed The Logon error.
#7 – Reset Windows 10 Without Deleting Personal Files
Resetting or Reinstalling Windows 10 without deleting personal files is another way to fix the User Profile Cannot Be Loaded error. Although your personal files will not be deleted from the computer, all the installed software and apps will be deleted in this process. So, uninstalled apps do not bother you, try this method out. Make sure that you are logged in to Windows with the Administrator account (refer to Method #2, Activating Hidden Admin Account section). Follow these steps:
Step 1: Open the Windows Start menu and click on the Settings option.
Step 2: The Settings window will open. There, click on the Update & security option.
Step 3: In the Update & security window, click on the Recovery option.
Step 4: When you are in the Recovery window, a Reset this PC section would be available with a Get started button; click on Get Started.
Step 5: From the two options that appear next, click on the Keep my files option. Just a reminder, all the software installed on your PC will be removed, but the personal files will remain as is.
Now, as you proceed, Windows 10 will be reset / reinstalled on your PC. When the Windows 10 reset is done, it would have fixed the corrupted user profile. After the restart, try to login with your original ID.
Closing Words
These were some of the processes that have worked the most to fix The User Profile Service Failed The Logon, User Profile Cannot Be Loaded Windows 10 error for users worldwide. The ultimate thing that you can do if you are not able to fix the issue is to create a new user profile and copy all the backup data from the backup which you can create as mentioned in the Create Backup section at the top.