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I have 5 msedge and 7 msedgewevview2 process running on my Windows 10. I would like to kill them and ban them. I never want to use MSEdge. There are three services, one of which is Automatic - Updater Service.

Is it safe to kill all such services and processes? The only reason I am asking is that sometimes MS bundles other activities/tasks in.

Rohit Gupta
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  • If you just stop the services in questions they will just be restarted automatically. This is a potential duplicate. By removing Edge the way suggested in the duplicate you likely will break anything that requires it. I removed it on a system, in order to reinstall it so I could process the import of the Legacy Edge profile, the issue that surfaced by doing that nearly broke the installation. By uninstall Microsoft Edge you also uninstalling WebView2 which will break any application that uses it. – Ramhound Jan 04 '23 at 00:21
  • I wasnt proposing uninstalling them, just disabling them. Similarly with services, I could disable them. But I get your point, there are likely to be some applications that may use edge from within. – Rohit Gupta Jan 04 '23 at 00:28
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    You can't just disable the services you mentioned, eventually, they will be reenabled. You would be playing "whack a mole" on the number of reasons they are enabled (far to many actions to list). You can disable Edge from updating with the appropriate group policy. The service will still run but it won't be able to do anything. – Ramhound Jan 04 '23 at 00:39

2 Answers2

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Edge is not natively uninstallable. It does no harm to remove the shortcut and not use it.

It likewise does no harm (certainly should not) to leave the services running. Leaving them will prevent damage we do not see right at this point .

I would just leave it. Even Chrome is now almost indistinguishable from Edge.

There are many other services (on my machine) (over 100) that I do not use, but they do not appear to cause any issue. So I do not turn then off. CPU runs <5% most of the time.

John
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  • With the number of services running, they miniscule effects add up. I like to keep it clean. I run a Process manager that can kill them as soon as they start. – Rohit Gupta Jan 03 '23 at 23:03
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From your description, the issue might be that some third-party apps rely on Edge.

For example, starting a video conference session using the independent Zoom client application (as opposed to running Zoom in a browser) opens eight instances of MS Edge WebView2! As soon as Zoom is completely closed (not minimized to taskbar), those instances also close. Below is a view in Task Manager on the Details tab.

MS Edge Processes in Zoom

You can kill each instance of msedgewebview2.exe, but either Zoom will resurrect them, or the Zoom session itself will die. C'est la vie.

DrMoishe Pippik
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  • I use Zoom (Load it and then unload when done). The average number of services does not change appreciably and average CPU load does not change appreciably. – John Jan 04 '23 at 01:59
  • Interesting, I hadn't noticed that. But I think that the default for Delphi Application Webbrowser component is now Edge. – Rohit Gupta Jan 04 '23 at 02:28
  • @John, not services, but running processes. The number of services stays constant, unless one is specifically installed (e.g., by a new application) or removed (e.g., by a knowledgeable user). Open Task Manager, turn to Details and look. – DrMoishe Pippik Jan 04 '23 at 14:38
  • Ticked because, if Zoom uses it then I can't kill them with a rule in Bill2'2 Process Monitor – Rohit Gupta Jan 25 '23 at 12:33
  • Though Sordum's Edge Blocker (https://www.sordum.org/9312/edge-blocker-v1-7/) stops the Edge browser itself, it does not seem to interfere with Zoom using MSEdgeWebView2.exe. Since I've just started using Sordum's app, I'll update this if I find a downside. – DrMoishe Pippik Jan 25 '23 at 14:57