Notepad++ closing automatically just after opening

PeterJones

If you open notepad++ without a specific file, does it stay open? If so, could you share ? menu, debug info.

But, as @Allan346 says, installing the most recent version might fix the issue.

jabcreations

Open the Task Manager (click “More details” at the bottom left if you haven’t done this years ago) and see if the process is already running though somehow missing a task on the taskbar. If it’s not then that isn’t the issue. At that point I’d try renaming the AppData profile information and see if it’s a profile bug. That folder is located at C:\Users[YOUR_USER_NAME]\AppData\Roaming\Notepad++; be sure to use the proper Windows user name.

Atharv Singh

@Allan346 I have done it and I have even downgraded to other versions

Atharv Singh

Sorry for the late response I did not know the community would offer help so fast.

Atharv Singh

@PeterJones It doesn’t

Atharv Singh

Alright so, after many days (today) I decided to reinstall Notepad++ and for some reason it works again.

Nika Tsiklauri

Hello everyone! Out of sudden, I have that same problem. Tried above steps, tried to reinstall notepad++ several times, even different versions. It all started when I updated notepad++. When I needed to open file in editor, it just suddenly closed. Now, I tried these suggestions, but the issue persist. What else can I do? I’ve observed that sometimes it stays open, but when it happens and when I press arrow keys (because I am a screen reader user), it closes. I have tried to disable the screen reader to check if the issue was there and then reopened again, but issue is still there. Then I have tried to open notepad++ from the command line to see if it displayed some output so I could know what’s going on, no outputs. What else should I do? Thanks in advance.

PeterJones

@nika-tsiklauri ,

Unlike the discussion from two years ago, I am guessing that yours is likely because you are using Notepad++ v8.3 or newer, but have an old plugin installed which is now incompatible (there was a plugin API change at v8.3). Try running with the -noPlugin argument. If that works, then you will need to look at which plugins you are using, and get new versions of any that have updated.

And, as I said two years ago, sharing ?-menu’s Debug Info is helpful for diagnosing problems (if you can get to that point – if not, right click on notepad++.exe and look at the Details tab to let us know version info, etc)

Nika Tsiklauri

@peterjones Thanks for so quick reply. I was able to get to that point. Here’s the info requested.

Notepad++ v8.4 (64-bit)
Build time : Apr 20 2022 - 03:31:06
Path : C:\Program Files\Notepad++\notepad++.exe
Command Line :
Admin mode : OFF
Local Conf mode : OFF
Cloud Config : OFF
OS Name : Windows 10 Pro (64-bit)
OS Version : 2009
OS Build : 19043.1645
Current ANSI codepage : 1252
Plugins : mimeTools.dll NppBplistPlugin.dll nppConverter.dll nppplugin_svn.dll

Besides that, I have noticed that when I press the left arrow key on keyboard it exits. Here is the details section of the file itself from the source folder:

file version: 8.4.0.0
product version: 8.4
size: 5.92 mb
Is there any other information I can provide to debug this?
Thanks

PeterJones

@nika-tsiklauri said in Notepad++ closing automatically just after opening:

Plugins : mimeTools.dll NppBplistPlugin.dll nppConverter.dll nppplugin_svn.dll

The svn plugin hasn’t been updated since 2019; the bplist since 2020. That means both of them are potential causes, because neither have been updated since Notepad++ v8.3 came out recently. (The other two are distributed with Notepad++ and are known-working plugins, so aren’t the problem).

Again, I say, “Try running with the -noPlugin argument.” If that works, then the problem is with one or both of those two plugins. I was able to install both those plugins and create a new document and arrow around, but I didn’t actually use them, so it might be that under your setup, they are actually calling one of the changed API calls, and thus causing the crash. To narrow it down, rename either C:\Program Files\Notepad++\Plugins\NppBplistPlugin or C:\Program Files\Notepad++\Plugins\nppplugin_svn to disable one of the two plugins and run Notepad++ again – if Notepad++ works when you disable one of those, then that is the culprit plugin. Once you have determined which plugin is the culprit, report the issues on their individual issues page: bplist plugin issues, svn plugin issues

Nika Tsiklauri

@peterjones I’ve uninstalled all above mentioned plugins, same issue occurs after arrowing to the left. Please see log below.

Notepad++ v8.4 (64-bit)
Build time : Apr 20 2022 - 03:31:06
Path : C:\Program Files\Notepad++\notepad++.exe
Command Line :
Admin mode : OFF
Local Conf mode : OFF
Cloud Config : OFF
OS Name : Windows 10 Pro (64-bit)
OS Version : 2009
OS Build : 19043.1645
Current ANSI codepage : 1252
Plugins : mimeTools.dll nppConverter.dll

I am thinking to uninstall notepad++ and reinstall it again since all of those plugins are out of system now.

Nika Tsiklauri

I have installed the older version, 8.2.1 and it works fine for now. Probably will wait untill next version comes up, maybe the issue will be fixed then.

rdipardo

@nika-tsiklauri,

I am a screen reader user

As reported on GitHub, you cannot safely use any current 64-bit Notepad++ version with the NVDA or JAWS screen reader:

Unfortunately, it’s the screen readers that have to adapt, so I would stick with 8.2.1 or else use 32-bit Notepad++ for the time being.

The maintainer of the underlying software component is aware of the problem and recently addressed it on the Scintilla mailing list:

When Scintilla implemented support for documents larger than 2GB, most of its APIs were able to support 64-bit positions. However, some were defined with structs containing fixed width position fields which were not changed. The key Sci_CharacterRange struct uses ‘long’ for positions which is 64-bit on 64-bit Unix systems but 32-bit on 64-bit Win32 systems.

The SCI_GETTEXTRANGE API was thus unable to retrieve text past the 2GB point in huge documents on Windows. This API is sometimes used between running applications for automation and accessibility purposes. This makes it more difficult to change since some applications would be compiled with the new definition and some with the old definition which would cause crashes.

Nika Tsiklauri

@rdipardo Got it, Thanks. have read the github page and saw that my screen reader would fix it in the 2022 update. Thanks.

Maris Novozilovs

@PeterJones The issue is still happening from time to time even now (in 2025), but Your solution still works. Big Thanks!