Helping people with computers... one answer at a time.
You can only be logged into one Hotmail account at a time in a browser window. That often feels like the other account just "disappeared."
I happen to be guided to create a new Hotmail account. Then I lost the previous one. How can I connect to the previous one? It just happened two hours ago. Multiple accounts in Hotmail. It was totally frustrating in the name of security. Both are my account with the previous address is impossible to reach. Please help.
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In this excerpt from Answercast #22, I walk through the steps necessary to log out of one Hotmail account so you can find and use another account. The solution is often just that easy.
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Lost Hotmail account
It's unclear to me exactly what's happened here. You haven't really specified the steps that you took to try and gain access to your account. I'm going to make a guess based on what I see a lot of people overlooking.
So, when you log into account "A" then and that's what's on the screen, it may not be clear as to how to log into a different account.
First sign out
- There is a Sign Out button or a Sign Out link!
If you look in the upper right of your Hotmail page, when you're logged into Hotmail, you should see your name and underneath that two words:
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"Profile" which will let you look at the information that Hotmail has about you
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and Sign Out.
The trick is to simply sign out from the account that you're currently logged in as. At that point, you'll probably be taken to the MSN.com homepage where you can then click on Hotmail in the upper left and you'll be asked to sign in.
Log back in to desired account
You can then specify the other Hotmail email address and password that should allow you to login to the other account.
If this doesn't work for you, I need to understand specifically what steps of
this process are failing for you and exactly how they're failing; what kinds of
error message you're getting, [and] what kind of things aren't showing up that you
expect.
Next from Answercast 22- Can I open Outlook PST files read-only?
Article C5406 - May 31, 2012 « »
Leo A. Notenboom has been playing with computers since he
was required to take a programming class in 1976. An 18 year career as a programmer at Microsoft soon followed.
After "retiring" in 2001, Leo started Ask Leo! in 2003 as a place for answers
to common computer and technical questions. More about Leo.
June 1, 2012 11:32 AM
Actually you can log in to both accounts at the same time by using two browsers.
I can log in to one using Firefox while logged into my 2nd account using IE.
June 4, 2012 7:35 PM
It happens that Hotmail also gives you the ability to switch back and forth between accounts. Click on Options (upper rt.)>More Options >Sending/receiving email from other accounts. You can add your alternate email address and then it will appear in the dropdown when you click the arrow next to your name (upper rt.).
11-Jun-2012
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