Tried to troubleshoot the former broken update problem and messed up the system

Anki Help
1

I encountered the update problem that many people have mentioned here already regarding the latest update version. I tried to troubleshoot it using AI (bad idea, I know), but after it took me in circles for an hour, I gave up. By that time I had already deleted the old version of Anki and attempted to reinstall it, hoping it would provide me the old Anki app to use while I waited for the update problem to be resolved. However, the app would always send me back to the broken Anki app. I downloaded the latest version once it came out (the broken version and the old version are both deleted at this point), but the app keeps giving me the message that an Anki app is already running and to close that one first (Windows 11 device here). I’ve checked all the files already for any old app as well as the processor, it all says that there is no Anki app still operating. How do I fix this?

2

The most efficient way to end all of the processes is to restart your computer. Some of the attached processes might still be running, like python and mpv.

To make sure everything is uninstalled, go through your Windows settings and uninstall. Then delete the program files locations – Managing Files - Anki Manual . Then you can do a fresh install.

3

I’m afraid it does not work. I’ve tried looking through the files and uninstalled it there. The app is gone from settings. I’ve restarted the computer twice as well. The only Anki-related files I have left are the python-version, uv, uvw, pyproject. toml, and versions. I’m still getting the same error message that Anki is already running. I would remove some other files, but I’m not certain which ones I can delete without deleting the data I had on the other app (if it isn’t gone already).

4

That data would only be gone if you deleted it and didn’t have a backup or have your collection synced to AnkiWeb.

See the link for how to tell the program directories apart from your user data. Or, just rename the directories if you don’t want to delete them yet.

5

I was going through old app data and I found an anki-console file that must be from the old one. (The new Anki app completely does not open anymore). When I tried to open the Anki console file it gave me this message in the terminal:

"Starting Anki 26.09.2…
2026-09-17 [i blanked this out] :INFO:aqt.mediasrv: Serving on http://[i blanked this out]

Unhandled Exception: System.AccessViolationException: Attempted to read or write protected memory. This is often an indication that other memory is corrupt.
at PyObject_Call(_object* , _object* , _object* )
at Main(String args)"

6

There’s no need to run old versions of anki-console. That just runs Anki, which you already know is broken.

You need to –

  1. Restart your computer so you can be sure nothing related to Anki is running.
  2. Go to your Windows Settings and uninstall Anki, if you find it there.
  3. Go to the program files locations – Managing Files - Anki Manual – and delete or rename those folders. [If you find a folder called Anki2 – that isn’t a program folder, and you should leave it alone.]
  4. Restart your computer again.
  5. Download the current release – Anki - powerful, intelligent flashcards – and install it.
7

I’m going to try that just now, but may I ask which files specifically I should remove? Related to Anki, the files listed are: Anki (newest), anki.install-manifest, anki-console (Windows batch file), anki-console (application), icon (ICO file), some python files, uninstall (application), uv (application), uvw (application), and versions (Python file).

8

I haven’t suggested deleting specific files. If you look at the link, those are folders, so deleting them means deleting every file in the folder. We can’t predict where you have Anki installed on your computer, but those are the default locations, so that’s the first place to look.

The Windows installer is meant to clean up the old install as part of its process, but that hasn’t been working correctly, leading to these issues folks have been seeing. The installer has been fine with “fresh” installs though, so anything you actually need going forward will come from that.

But as I said, if you are concerned about deleting so much right now, it should work to just rename the folder – call it Anki-delete-old or whatever you like. The installer won’t acknowledge it as the correct directory, so it will create it anew. You can clean up and delete those unused folders later.

9

I tried cleaning up the old files, but it just didn’t work. I ended up installing the old 26.08 system, and the app worked with all my old data in it, which is all I needed. I’ll just run on this old system. I thank you sincerely for your time and assistance!