Solution to ‘Windows Update cannot currently check for updates, because the service is not running. You may need to restart your computer’. Dec 2017

Anonymous
2017-12-11T20:19:37+00:00

I have seen many people experiencing the problem of ‘Windows Update cannot currently check for updates, because the service is not running. You may need to restart your computer’.

Today, 11th Dec 2017, I have had exactly the same problem with going in to Windows Update on Win 7 PC’s and getting this same scenario when I try to update windows.  I go in to Control Panel and Windows Update.  There is a red X in the box and when I click ‘Check for Updates’ I get the message

‘Windows Update cannot currently check for updates, because the service is not running. You may need to restart your computer’.

I restarted the PC and still had the same the same problem and I also checked the Update Service was running and it was.

I have One laptop and 4 PC’s at home all running Win 7 so I tried the same procedure of updating and all but one had the same issue as above.  I contacted a few friends whom I know have PC’s running Win 7 and when I asked them to try updating Windows they had the same problem I had.  The settings in Windows Update varied from ‘Download updates but let me choose when to install them’ ,  ‘Install updates automatically ( recommended)’, ‘Never check for updates ( not recommended)’ .  Ironically, the only PC I found I could check for updates was the one set to ‘Never check for updates ( not recommended)’. So we changed the settings on all the PC’s to‘Never check for updates ( not recommended)’ and then rebooted & then tried to check for updates and we could in all instances.**  We then changed the settings back to our preference of either *‘Install updates automatically ( recommended)’*or ‘Download updates but let me choose when to install them’ and all is well again. So, it looks as though there has been a common problem with a previous Windows 7 Update that caused this update problem recently.  

Can anyone from Microsoft please look in to this as there may be many people thinking their PC's are being updated and they aren't!

Since posting this a year ago it's obvious from the responses that the above fix doesn't work for everyone but it's certainly worth giving the above solution a shot as it's so simple, if it doesn't then follow one of the other solutions mentioned further on in the discussion.  Once you have the updates working again the problem does not reoccur so obviously Microsoft fixed the problem in a subsequent update. I also notice that one year on and some people are still only just discovering Windows has not been updating all this time, so guess it pays to check updates are being installed occasionally!

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Windows update

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments

223 answers

Sort by: Newest
Most helpful Newest Oldest
  1. Anonymous
    2018-04-06T01:18:40+00:00

    Was this answer helpful?

    2 people found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  2. Anonymous
    2018-04-04T19:48:41+00:00

    Sure, because you want to have Microsoft determine when to nuke your Update History due to them causing Microsoft Update to stall.

    Was this answer helpful?

    1 person found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  3. Anonymous
    2018-04-04T13:52:37+00:00

    I discovered a solution to the problem where trying to run Windows Update resulted in the pop-up message " *Windows Update cannot currently check for updates, because the service is not running. You may need to restart your computer"*on the WinTips website here.

    I followed the instructions from Solution #2 to resolve the error manually:

    Step 1: Stop Windows Update service.

    a. Simultaneously press Windows key + R  to open run command box.

    b. Inside run command box, type: services.msc and press Enter.

    c. In the Services window that just opened, search for Windows Update service, then right click on it and select Stop.

    d. Without closing the services window, proceed to the next step.

    Step 2: Delete or Rename Windows update temporary storage folder.

    To do this:

    a. Open “My Computer” and navigate to “C:Windows”folder**.**

    b. Delete (or Rename e.g. to “SoftwareDistributionOLD”) the “SoftwareDistribution” folder.

    (note:  I personally chose the option to rename the folder to SoftwareDistributionOLD, which seemed a far safer and easier to undo if this did not work!)

    Step 3: Start Windows Update service.

    a. In the Services window that you opened in Step 1, right click on the Windows Update service and select Start .

    b. Try to update Windows again.

    This solution worked for me, hopefully it will for you as well!

    Was this answer helpful?

    20+ people found this answer helpful.
    0 comments
  4. Anonymous
    2018-03-27T16:18:56+00:00

    This solution worked for me, however, I also had to clear the Windows Update cache via the Windows Troubleshooter.

    My problem was when I would check for updates, it would hang (not even give me the message:

    'Windows Update cannot currently check for updates, because the service is not running. You may need to restart your computer'

    Also when I checked the settings to 'nver check for updates' - it was stuck there, that's when I used the Troubleshooter to clear the cache.

    And now it works perfectly!

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments
  5. Anonymous
    2018-03-26T15:11:21+00:00

    Good luck getting help from Microsoft. They won't admit that their own update caused a problem. That would obligate them to actually do something about it.

    Best bet, create a Linux disk, I use Mint and Ubuntu. Run Linux from the disk (without installing) until you are comfortable with it, then dump Microsoft Windows. When using Microsoft products, you all but sign physical ownership of YOUR machine over to them, to do as they please, then charge you $$$ for lame advice on how to straighten things out again, which usually takes hours and fixes nothing.

    If you simply must have Microsoft Windows, install it onto a separate hard drive and boot into it only when needed.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments