You click Teams and the window opens, but there is nothing in it. It is plain white or black, or it shows the Teams logo and a spinner that never ends. There is usually no error message at all. Often it starts right after a Teams update, a Windows update, a graphics driver change, or new security software.
This article walks through the checks in order: first work out whether the app or the account is at fault, then try the lightest fixes, then the ones that delete local data.
Applies to: the new Microsoft Teams desktop app on Windows 10 and 11. Microsoft retired classic Teams on 1 July 2025 (end of support was 1 July 2024), and on classic Teams the cache lived in %appdata%\Microsoft\Teams. If you are following an older guide that tells you to empty that folder, it will not help here. This article covers Windows only.
What is going on
New Teams is a packaged (MSIX) Windows app that draws its screens with Microsoft Edge WebView2, the same embedded browser engine used by the new Outlook and Windows Widgets. If the app’s local cache is damaged, if WebView2 is missing or broken, or if security software blocks WebView2 from starting, Teams has nothing to draw. The window opens and stays empty.
That is why a blank window is not necessarily a Teams bug. Microsoft’s troubleshooting pages list security products that interfere with WebView2 and treat “a blank or white embedded window” as a prompt to check that WebView2 processes are running.
Diagnosis
1. Rule out the account and the network
Open Teams on the web in Edge or another browser and sign in. If that works, your account and licence are fine and the problem is in the desktop app. If the web version is also blank or fails to sign in, fix that first (network, proxy, sign-in or a service problem) and leave the app alone.
2. Make sure Teams is really closed
A hung Teams process can reopen as a blank window. Right-click the Teams icon in the notification area and choose Quit, or end it in Task Manager. In PowerShell, the new Teams process is ms-teams:
Get-Process ms-teams -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | Select-Object Id, StartTime, Responding
Stop-Process -Name ms-teams -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinueLeave other WebView2 processes alone. msedgewebview2.exe is shared by other apps, so killing all of them can close or break your Outlook or Widgets. End the Teams entries only.
3. Check WebView2 is running and installed
Start Teams, then open Task Manager and expand Microsoft Teams (or look on the Details tab). When it is healthy you will see ms-teams.exe with several msedgewebview2.exe child processes (renderer, GPU, network). Microsoft’s guidance is that if no WebView2 child processes appear, or the renderer and GPU processes appear briefly and vanish, something such as application control, an endpoint security product or antivirus is blocking or ending them. Also open Settings > Apps > Installed apps and look for Microsoft Edge WebView2 Runtime.
4. Look at the installed package
Get-AppxPackage -Name MSTeams | Select-Object Name, Version, InstallLocation, StatusThis should return one row for your user. An empty result means Teams is not installed for you at all (for example after a profile or policy change), and no amount of cache clearing will help; it needs installing again. Folders named MSTeams_... and ending _8wekyb3d8bbwe are where Windows places the installed package.
Root cause
In practice it is one of three things: a damaged local Teams cache or profile, a missing or broken WebView2 Runtime, or security or application-control software stopping WebView2 from starting. A third-party antivirus or data-loss-prevention tool is the one people forget, because it was installed long before the problem began. Microsoft’s page on this lists specific products and their injected DLLs that are known to cause hangs and crashes.
The fix
Work down the list, lightest first. Microsoft cautions that clearing the Teams cache is not a general first step and that it removes the diagnostic logs needed to find the cause of other problems. For a blank client window it is a reasonable targeted step. It is not the right fix for missing messages, a channel not showing or wrong unread counts. On a work PC, ask IT before the reset or reinstall steps.
A. Update and restart
Install pending Windows updates and restart. Microsoft has fixed some new Teams installation problems through Windows updates, and a restart releases anything the app left locked.
B. Repair the app
Go to Settings > Apps > Installed apps, search for Microsoft Teams, select the … button on the new Teams entry, and choose Advanced options. If Windows shows a Repair button, use it: it keeps the app’s data. Microsoft’s Teams cache article documents the Reset button and does not describe Repair, so treat this as the generic Windows packaged-app repair rather than a Teams-specific procedure.
C. Clear the new Teams cache
Quit Teams. This is Microsoft’s documented “delete the files” method. The path is below the LocalCache folder, not the whole of it:
# Microsoft documents this path (Run box: %userprofile%\appdata\local\Packages\MSTeams_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\Microsoft\MSTeams)
Remove-Item "$env:LOCALAPPDATA\Packages\MSTeams_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalCache\Microsoft\MSTeams\*" -Recurse -ForceStart Teams. The first start takes longer than usual while the cache is rebuilt. Delete only the contents of that folder. Do not delete the MSTeams_8wekyb3d8bbwe package folder itself, and do not touch C:\Program Files\WindowsApps.
D. Reset the app
Quit Teams, then Settings > Apps > Installed apps > Microsoft Teams > … > Advanced options > Reset. Microsoft warns that resetting deletes the app’s data, including any personalisation settings you set. Your chats and teams live in Microsoft 365, not on the PC, so they come back when you sign in. Restart Teams afterwards.
E. Repair or reinstall WebView2
If Task Manager showed no WebView2 processes, or WebView2 is missing from Installed apps, install the Evergreen runtime from Microsoft’s WebView2 download page (developer.microsoft.com/microsoft-edge/webview2) and restart. The Evergreen installer updates or repairs an existing runtime. Other web advice tells you to delete WebView2 keys from the registry; do not do that unless Microsoft Support asks you to.
F. Check security software
Microsoft’s guidance for third-party antivirus and DLP tools on new Teams is to exclude these processes: msedgewebview2.exe, ms-teams.exe, ms-teamsupdate.exe and msteams_autostarter.exe. Find the install location with Get-AppPackage -name "msteams" if the tool needs a path. It is an IT task on managed PCs; send the list to whoever runs the security product.
G. Last resort: reinstall
Uninstall Microsoft Teams from Installed apps, restart, and install the current new Teams. If the install is blocked with a message about organisation policy, Microsoft lists two Group Policy settings that can block the MSIX package (Prevent non-admin users from installing packaged Windows apps and Allow all trusted apps to install), which only your IT team can change.
Verification
Start Teams from the Start menu. A good result is a sign-in prompt or your account being picked up automatically, then the left rail, chat list and a channel loading with messages. Check Task Manager once: ms-teams.exe with msedgewebview2.exe children that stay running. Restart the PC and open Teams once more to confirm it did not just work for one session.
Notes
- Hardware acceleration. Older guides say to switch it off in Teams settings, or to edit
desktop-config.json. That file belongs to classic Teams, and Microsoft’s documentation does not describe a supported equivalent for new Teams, so it is not a step here. If a blank or flickering window follows a graphics driver change, update or roll back the display driver instead. - Reinstalling Windows is never the answer to a blank Teams window. The local cache and the app package are separate from the operating system.
- Many users at once? Check for a recent Teams, WebView2, security-agent or Windows policy change before touching individual PCs.
- If you need Teams today, use Teams on the web in Edge while you sort out the app. Your chats, files and meetings are the same.
- For administrators: Microsoft’s article “Resolve issues when starting the new Teams app” covers checks for folder permissions and package access that are meant for administrators. Use it if the steps above change nothing.
Tried all of this? Describe what Task Manager shows for ms-teams.exe and msedgewebview2.exe, which security product is installed, and what the Get-AppxPackage -Name MSTeams line returns, in The Patch Panel. The best answer earns points on Top of the Stack.