Photos.exe High CPU Usage on Windows 11/10

Introduction

When the Microsoft Photos app (Photos.exe) suddenly pegs your CPU—sometimes even when you’re not actively editing anything – it’s usually doing one of a few “heavy” background jobs: scanning folders you’ve added, generating thumbnails/previews, processing video formats, or running features like people/face grouping. The result is noisy fans, battery drain, and sluggish performance.

This tutorial walks through a practical, layered approach:

• Fast actions to stop the spike now
• Root-cause fixes (folder sources, background permissions, cache/thumbnails)
• “Last resort” repairs (repair/reset/reinstall) and OS-level remediation
• A quick security sanity check to ensure it’s the real Photos app

Potential Quick Fixes

Try these in order – many cases stop here.

1. Give it 5–15 minutes (first-run or new-folder indexing)
   If you just opened Photos after a long time or added a large folder, CPU usage can be temporarily high while it builds its local index and thumbnails.
2. Close Photos completely and relaunch
   • Press Ctrl + Shift + Esc → Task Manager
   • Find Photos → End task
   • Reopen Photos and see if CPU settles within a minute
3. Stop Photos from running in the background (Windows 11/10)
   • Settings → Apps → Installed apps (or Apps & features on some Windows 10 builds)
   • Find Photos → Advanced options
   • Under Background app permissions, set Let this app run in background to Never
4. Update the Photos app
   • Open the Store app → Library → Get updates
   • If updates fail, reset the Store cache with Win + R → wsreset.exe

If Photos.exe still runs hot after the above, continue.

What Usually Causes Photos.exe to Spike CPU

Common triggers (you’ll fix these directly in the next sections):

• Too many indexed sources (Pictures + extra drives + network shares + cloud-sync folders)
• Thumbnail generation loops (corrupt thumbnails or huge media libraries)
• Problematic media files (corrupt JPEG/PNG, very large RAWs, certain video containers/codecs)
• App state corruption (Photos cache/index gets stuck)
• System image issues (less common, but real—especially after interrupted updates)

Prerequisites

• A Windows account with permission to change app settings (admin helps for some steps)
• Optional (advanced, but useful):
  • Advanced process/file tracing tools (to pinpoint which file Photos is repeatedly reading)

Step-by-Step Guide

Step 1: Make sure Photos.exe is the legitimate Photos process

This is a quick security check: malware sometimes masquerades as common process names.

1. Open Task Manager → Details tab.
2. Right-click Photos.exe (or Microsoft.Photos.exe) → Open file location.
3. Expected location is typically under the WindowsApps package directory, for example:
   C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\Microsoft.Windows.Photos_…\Photos.exe
4. If the executable lives somewhere suspicious (e.g., %Temp%, a random user folder), do this:
   • Run a full scan with your endpoint security tool
   • Verify the file’s digital signature in file properties

Step 2: Reduce Photos “source folders” to stop runaway indexing

If Photos is tracking too many folders (especially large, external, or network locations), CPU usage can stay elevated.

1. 1. Open Photos.
   2. Go to Folders.

1. Remove non-essential locations (especially network shares, old backup drives, huge archives).
2. Keep only what you actually browse day-to-day (e.g., Pictures, a current project folder).

Tip: If you need occasional access to an archive, don’t add it as a permanent source—open files from File Explorer instead.

Step 3: Disable background activity for Photos (properly)

Even if you closed the window, Photos can continue doing work in the background.

1. Settings → Apps → Installed apps
2. Photos → Advanced options
3. Under Background app permissions, set it to Never
4. Reboot once to ensure the permission change “sticks”.

Step 4: Repair, then Reset the Photos app

Repair is non-destructive; Reset wipes the app’s local data (not your photo library).

1. Settings → Apps → Installed apps
2. Photos → Advanced options
3. Click Repair
4. If CPU is still high, return and click Reset

What Reset affects:

• Photos’ local database/index/cache gets rebuilt
• You may need to reconfigure sources and preferences

Step 5: Clear thumbnail cache (when the spike is tied to previews)

If Photos is hammering CPU while you browse folders in Explorer or open large directories, the thumbnail pipeline can be involved.

1. Press Win + R, type cleanmgr, press Enter
2. Select your system drive (usually C:)
3. Check Thumbnails
4. Click OK → Delete Files
5. Reboot and test again

Note: The first folder browse after clearing thumbnails may feel slower – Windows is rebuilding cache.

Step 6: Reset the Store cache (when Photos won’t update cleanly)

Photos updates flow through the Store infrastructure; a broken Store cache can keep you stuck on a buggy build.

1. Press Win + R
2. Run: wsreset.exe
3. After the Store opens, go to Library → Get updates
4. Update Photos

Step 7: Identify and isolate a “poison” media file

If CPU spikes only when Photos hits a specific folder/date, assume there’s at least one problematic file.

1. Create a temporary folder: C:\Temp\Photos_Test
2. Move half the images/videos from the suspected folder into that temp folder
3. Reopen Photos and observe CPU
4. Repeat the split until you narrow down to a single file (binary search)

Once identified:

• Re-encode a problematic video (or open it in another player)
• Re-save a problematic image (open and “Save As” in a different viewer/editor)
• Keep that file out of indexed sources

Step 8: If “People” (face grouping) seems to trigger heavy processing

If CPU climbs after Photos starts analyzing your library for people grouping, you can reduce the load by toggling the feature.

• In Photos Settings, turn off the People option (if present) and restart the app.

Step 9: Reinstall Photos (last resort for app-level corruption)

If Reset didn’t help, reinstalling can clear deeper package issues.

1. Open PowerShell as Administrator
2. Re-register Photos (common fix without needing the Store):
   1. Run:
      Get-AppxPackage -allusers Microsoft.Windows.Photos | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml"}
   2. Reboot and retest

If you manage endpoints at scale, consider doing this via provisioning/MDM scripts after validating the command in a test ring.

Step 10: Repair Windows system files (when multiple built-in apps misbehave)

If Photos isn’t the only app acting up, fix the component store and system files:

1. Open Command Prompt (Admin) 
2. Run:
   1. DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
   2. sfc /scannow

Reboot and test Photos again.

Validation and Testing

After each step, validate with Task Manager:

1. Open Task Manager → Processes
2. Launch Photos and open a folder that previously triggered the spike
3. Expected behavior:
   • Short burst of CPU (a few seconds) is normal
   • Sustained high CPU (minutes) after idle usually indicates ongoing indexing/corruption or a stuck loop

If you want deeper visibility, use advanced process monitoring to confirm whether Photos is repeatedly accessing a particular file or folder.

Security Hardening

Even though this is “just a performance problem,” it’s worth tightening a few things:

• Keep Windows and built-in apps updated.
• Avoid indexing untrusted or remote folders as permanent Photos sources.
• If you routinely handle images from untrusted sources:
  • Prefer opening in a sandbox/VM
  • Keep endpoint protections enabled
  • Consider using a lightweight viewer for first-open triage

Conclusion

Photos.exe high CPU on Windows 11/10 is almost always fixable without reinstalling Windows. The biggest wins typically come from:

• Removing oversized/remote folders from Photos sources
• Disabling background permissions for Photos
• Repair/Reset to clear a corrupted local index
• Clearing thumbnail cache when preview generation loops

If none of that works, reinstalling Photos and running DISM/SFC usually resolves stubborn cases.

FAQ