Why Too Many Svchost.exe (Service Host) Process Running in Task Manager

[zoran]

You may find 50+ svchost.exe processes running in Task Manager and you'll start wondering what thing is causing so many svchost.exe processes running in your device? You might also think that these processes are the actual reason behind your computer is running slow since a few days. Right?

 

Actually no! There is no need to worry if too many svchost.exe process running in your Windows 10 computer. Its absolutely normal and a feature by design. Its not any issue or problem in your computer.

 

Svchost.exe is known as "Service Host" or "Host Process for Windows Services". Its a system process which is used by several Windows services since the release of Windows 2000 operating system. In previous Windows versions, several similar services were combined into a single svchost.exe process to reduce overall system resources consumption. But since the release of Windows 10 Creators Update, this behavior has been changed. Now in newer Windows 10 versions, the services which were grouped in previous Windows versions, are separated and run in their own Svchost process.

 

This change has been implemented to increase system stability, reliability and security. When services were grouped in a single svchost.exe process, one service crash could affect the other services running in the same process group. Now when services are separated and using their own host process, it improves the stability and reliability of Windows 10 machine.

 

There is one condition! The services will use separate svchost.exe process only if your Windows 10 machine has 3.5+ GB of RAM. On systems with 3.5 GB or less RAM, the services will be grouped in single svchost.exe process similar to older Windows versions.

 

Also some Windows services are still grouped such as Remote Procedure Call and RPC Endpoint Mapper services are always grouped. Similarly, Windows Firewall and Base Filtering Engine services are always grouped no matter how much RAM your computer has.

So you see several instances of svchost.exe process run in Windows 10 to improve stability of your computer and its not an issue at all.

 

But still you are worried about the number of svchost.exe process, you can disable this new feature and force Windows 10 to group similar services into single svchost.exe process like previous Windows versions.

 

Microsoft provides a method for experts to turn off the separate svchost.exe process use by each Windows service. With the help of this method, you can minimize the number of svchost.exe processes running in your Windows 10 machine.

 

This method requires editing of Windows Registry. If you also want to reduce number of svchost.exe processes running in Task Manager, following steps will help you:

1. Press WIN+R keys together to launch RUN dialog box. Now type regedit and press Enter. It'll open Registry Editor.

2. Now go to following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control

3. In right-side pane, look for a DWORD SvcHostSplitThresholdInKB. Its value is set to 380000 by default.

 

Now you need to set its value equal or greater than the amount of RAM (in KB) installed in your computer. For example, if your computer has 8 GB of RAM, you'll change the DWORD value to 8388608 or larger.

 

8 GB = 8x1024 MB = 8x1024x1024 KB = 8388608 KB

So double-click on SvcHostSplitThresholdInKB  DWORD and change its value to 8388608

 

 

 

4. After changing the value, close Registry Editor and restart your computer to take effects.

After reboot, check the Details tab in Task Manager and the number of svchost.exe process will be very less (When we recheck the number of svchost.exe from the task manager, I can see that the number that is more than 50 drops to 18-24, and this number may drop to 5-6.)  as shown in following screenshot:

 

 

PS: In future, if you decide to restore the feature to use separate svchost.exe process, restore the default value 380000 of SvcHostSplitThresholdInKB DWORD in Registry Editor.

 

source

 

[Kalju]

1 hour ago, zoran said:

 

Spoiler

 

You may find 50+ svchost.exe processes running in Task Manager and you'll start wondering what thing is causing so many svchost.exe processes running in your device? You might also think that these processes are the actual reason behind your computer is running slow since a few days. Right?

 

Actually no! There is no need to worry if too many svchost.exe process running in your Windows 10 computer. Its absolutely normal and a feature by design. Its not any issue or problem in your computer.

 

Svchost.exe is known as "Service Host" or "Host Process for Windows Services". Its a system process which is used by several Windows services since the release of Windows 2000 operating system. In previous Windows versions, several similar services were combined into a single svchost.exe process to reduce overall system resources consumption. But since the release of Windows 10 Creators Update, this behavior has been changed. Now in newer Windows 10 versions, the services which were grouped in previous Windows versions, are separated and run in their own Svchost process.

 

This change has been implemented to increase system stability, reliability and security. When services were grouped in a single svchost.exe process, one service crash could affect the other services running in the same process group. Now when services are separated and using their own host process, it improves the stability and reliability of Windows 10 machine.

 

There is one condition! The services will use separate svchost.exe process only if your Windows 10 machine has 3.5+ GB of RAM. On systems with 3.5 GB or less RAM, the services will be grouped in single svchost.exe process similar to older Windows versions.

 

Also some Windows services are still grouped such as Remote Procedure Call and RPC Endpoint Mapper services are always grouped. Similarly, Windows Firewall and Base Filtering Engine services are always grouped no matter how much RAM your computer has.

So you see several instances of svchost.exe process run in Windows 10 to improve stability of your computer and its not an issue at all.

 

But still you are worried about the number of svchost.exe process, you can disable this new feature and force Windows 10 to group similar services into single svchost.exe process like previous Windows versions.

 

Microsoft provides a method for experts to turn off the separate svchost.exe process use by each Windows service. With the help of this method, you can minimize the number of svchost.exe processes running in your Windows 10 machine.

 

This method requires editing of Windows Registry. If you also want to reduce number of svchost.exe processes running in Task Manager, following steps will help you:

1. Press WIN+R keys together to launch RUN dialog box. Now type regedit and press Enter. It'll open Registry Editor.

2. Now go to following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control

3. In right-side pane, look for a DWORD SvcHostSplitThresholdInKB. Its value is set to 380000 by default.

 

Now you need to set its value equal or greater than the amount of RAM (in KB) installed in your computer. For example, if your computer has 8 GB of RAM, you'll change the DWORD value to 8388608 or larger.

 

8 GB = 8x1024 MB = 8x1024x1024 KB = 8388608 KB

So double-click on SvcHostSplitThresholdInKB  DWORD and change its value to 8388608

 

 

 

4. After changing the value, close Registry Editor and restart your computer to take effects.

After reboot, check the Details tab in Task Manager and the number of svchost.exe process will be very less (When we recheck the number of svchost.exe from the task manager, I can see that the number that is more than 50 drops to 18-24, and this number may drop to 5-6.)  as shown in following screenshot:

 

 

PS: In future, if you decide to restore the feature to use separate svchost.exe process, restore the default value 380000 of SvcHostSplitThresholdInKB DWORD in Registry Editor.

 

source

 

 

 

 

 

 About using the units, because they are used incorrectly here. It is long history, why for a long ago was used such a values for bits and bytes, like above. But this isn't correct.
 It is very important to note, that in everyday usage is decimal sytem, not binary system, if somebody wants to write like above written, must always been added that this is in binary system. If not then kilo means alwas 1000 or unit x 10³

To be more precise, there's another one, it's a fundamental mistake. Namely, above is recommended to write the binary data value into the decimal data value field in the register. It's the second principal mistake.

 Which is harder to raise up because weighs more?
Is it one kilogram the bird feathers or one kilogram of the iron.

Note. The prefix of the units "kilo" means a thousand times that unit. And there is no exceptions. Prefix kilo is always the same, ie 1000 or unit x 10³  and never something else, even if speak about bits and bytes. And also is no matter that there is used the binary system or not.

 

Read more https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilobit 

[coromonadalix]

@Kalju  your kilo assumption is okay with weight , length  etc,,,  not for computer memory, hard drive stockage, usb key  etc...

 

 

here we go again  loll  this was an debate years ago

 

From

https://www.quora.com/Is-1-GB-equal-to-1024-MB-or-1000-MB

 

 

Kilobyte (KB): The smallest file stored on a smartphone, tablet or PC is typically four kilobytes (4KB) in size. A kilobyte is 1024 bytes, a. Therefore 1KB is the same as 1024 x 8 = 8192 binary digits.

Megabyte (MB): 1024KB equals one megabyte (MB),

Gigabyte (GB): There are 1024MB in one gigabyte.

Terabyte (TB): There are 1024GB in one terabyte (TB)

 

How many MBs are in a GB?

Hard drive manufacturers have long eschewed this system in favour of rounding down to make things easier (and also provide less storage space).

This means that 1000 bytes = 1 kilobyte and 1000 kilobytes = 1MB. Again, 1000MB = 1GB and 1000GB = 1TB.

Windows, however, sticks to the 1024 rule, which means it sees a 250GB hard drive as 232GB, and a 1TB drive as 931GB.

This explains why hard drives appear to have a lower capacity than advertised. A 1TB hard drive has the capacity to store 1,000,000,000,000 bytes. Divide this by 1024 and you get 976,562,500KB. Divide by 1024 again and you get 953,674.3MB. Finally, divide by 1024 to get gigabytes and you end up with 931.32GB.

[Kalju]

OK, if you do not understand otherwise, then 1000 bits of storage will require 1024 bits of storage space, but these are two different things. This can be said also differently - if you need to save 1kB of information to the disk, or anywhere, you need to have there 1,024KB of free space. That is the story. Why so? Find out yourself, but don't say that sometimes 1000 is equal to 1000 and sometimes not.

[front360]

@coromonadalix, I'm waiting and interested in reading your reply...