Ever wondered why a single Microsoft Edge tab results in so many Windows processes? Well, Microsoft now has a brief explanation for that. Web browser applications are central to our daily PC usage. It’s so important that Microsoft won’t even allow Windows 10 users to uninstall Edge.
Edge uses multi-process architecture
As users continue to rely more on web browsers than native apps, progressive web apps (PWAs) are now gaining momentum that promises to bridge the native app gap.
As your usage continues to increase, so does the resource-intensive PC consumption, which results in users often wondering about how memory usage impacts their experience.
In a recent blog post, Microsoft had this to say:
“We’re working to develop solutions to address this concern. These solutions include providing websites and extensions developers with information to help them use fewer resources and helping users understand how their browsing habits can affect Microsoft Edge’s resource usage.”
Microsoft has offered insights into how Edge uses PC resources and how your Internet consumption impacts PC resource usage.
Why am I seeing so many Windows processes with a single Edge tab?
This is a perfectly valid question and many of us have wondered about this for so long. To answer your question, Edge uses multi-process architecture. Meaning, Edge is split into different processes, as follows:
- Browser processes
- Renderer processes
- GPU process
- Utility processes
- Plug-in processes and extension processes
- Crashpad handler processes
As you can see from the above image, Edge is split into some nine different Windows processes and subprocesses comprising various functions. But interestingly, the number of processes and sub-processes vary as per usage patterns.
“Like other modern browsers, Microsoft Edge uses this architecture for better security, reliability, and resource accountability into how the browser is using resources. Microsoft Edge is built on the Chromium project and shares a common implementation with other Chromium browsers,” Microsoft added.
Following are the number of benefits of Edge using the multi-process architecture:
- Enhanced security
- Reliability
- Resource Accountability
In related news, Edge continues to challenge Chrome’s dominance in the global web browser market share, courtesy of a series of new additions in the form of PDF improvements and performance optimizations.
