[FIXED 2019-11-06] Steam client uses ~10% CPU when idle on Store page (steamwebhelper.exe) - Possible Bug?

[YorkyPudsy]

UPDATE: 2019-11-07
Seems to have been fixed (again) in the Steam Client Update dated 2019-11-06... (thanks!)
https://store.steampowered.com/news/55839/

... Fixed web rendering not pausing on Windows when Steam client is minimized or closed ...

..................................................................................................................

UPDATE: 2019-10-31
As pointed out by Fdexter on the bug report thread linked below & confirmed by myself, this bug has unfortunately returned. Certainly at some point in the last couple of months, perhaps in the latest round of updates with the Library changes? Not sure...
https://steamcommunity.com/groups/SteamClientBeta/discussions/0/1778261771155960698/?ctp=2#c1642052612840035331

..................................................................................................................

UPDATE: 2019-07-17
Happy to report this is now fixed for me, as of this Steam client update...
https://store.steampowered.com/news/52467/

...
+ Fixed certain web page elements continuing to render in the Steam client when it is minimized or closed to the system tray
...

The Steam Store home page still makes steamwebhelper.exe consume around 5-10% CPU while it's open/visible, but as soon as I minimise or close to system tray, the usage drops to near zero.

Many thanks to all for posting here & on the bug report thread!
Hopefully it's fixed for all of you too now.

..................................................................................................................

UPDATE: Apparently this is fixed in Steam beta client. I'll wait for the update to go public, but hopefully those of you on beta (or willing to switch to it) no longer have the CPU usage issue...

Originally posted by cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

And here is a dev saying the beta was patched...

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/SteamClientBeta/discussions/0/1637536330482506704/

:qr:

..................................................................................................................

UPDATE: 2019-07-05:
Big thanks to everyone who's posted so far to help confirm the issue!

I also started a Bug Report thread over here...

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/SteamClientBeta/discussions/0/1778261771155960698/

If you don't mind, please could you add a quick post (with any info you think relevant) to that other thread, to help get it noticed & investigated by Valve.

Cheers!

..............................................................................................

[ UPDATE: 2019-01-15:
Many thanks to everyone for your help & suggestions so far!

I now suspect the cause is some bug with the Steam "recommendation" system and the "carousels"/rotating images at the top of the Steam Store home page, which consumes more CPU than expected.

I'd be grateful if anyone can help confirm/disprove this pattern below... (on the standard and/or Beta Steam clients)

• If a user is signed in to the Steam client, then the "carousels"/cycling parts (Featured, Specials, Suggested Curators, etc.) at the top of the Steam Store home page seem to constantly consume a significant portion of CPU (10% average on an i5-4460), even after the page has fully loaded, and continuing even afer the Steam client window is closed (minimise to systray).
  
  
• It is the various "steamwebhelper.exe" processes which exhibit this CPU usage, with one of them constantly around 5% or higher, and others combining to make the total CPU vary between 5-15%, average about 10%.
  
  
• If you scroll down the page, past the "New & Trending" section (so that those "carousels"/dynamic parts disappear off the top of the view), then the CPU usage drops to near zero.
  
  
• After scrolling down the Store home page & the CPU drops to near zero, if you then scroll back up to the top of the page, the CPU usage stays near zero (with just occasional very brief spikes to about 1% whenever the main Featured carousel changes). This seems to indicate that it isn't the rendering/changing of the carousel itself that is the problem, but perhaps some stray/rogue process being triggered by that part of the page when it first loads, which gets flushed/reset after scrolling away from it?
  
  
• If you navigate to any other section of the Steam client (eg. Library, Discussions, Market, Workshop, Activity, Profile, etc.), then the CPU usage similarly drops to near zero. It is only the Store front page (specifically the home page) that causes this excess CPU usage.
  
  
• If you're NOT signed in (eg. viewing the Store home page in a standalone browser), or if you don't follow/ignore/wishlist many things, then the CPU usage appears to be minimal.

10% CPU on an i5-4460 seems very high for a simple rotating carousel. Once the page has loaded & determined what games/devs/curators to display, I would expect that CPU usage to drop to near zero. I believe this was the case several months ago, perhaps before recent changes to "recommendations".


@cSg|mc-Hotsauce - Thanks for the link!
When I have more time, I'll look into posting a bug report in that SteamClientBeta area.

Meanwhile, if anyone else can help confirm/disprove the above pattern, that would be very helpful. Especially if anyone uses the Beta Steam Client & can demonstrate the same problem there, as I've never used it & not sure what's involved or any risks of switching over to it temporarily to test something.

Cheers! ]

.....................................................................
ORIGINAL POST FOLLOWS
.....................................................................

Would anyone be kind enough to try the following & see if they get the same results..?
Thanks!

[EDIT: Note that I'm NOT on the Beta Steam client, now or ever previously, just in case this is an issue that has already been resolved there. Thought that might be worth mentioning.]

- If I open the Steam client on the "Store" main page, one of the "steamwebhelper.exe" processes appears to constantly consume an average of about 10% CPU in Task Manager (it wavers between 5-15%). Note: this is on a i5-4460, so I guess that %age may vary with hardware.

- The CPU usage remains similar even if I close the client window (leaving it minimised in the system tray), and after eg. launching a game through Steam (which is obviously not desirable!)

- However, if I navigate to various other non-store pages in the client (eg. the Steam "Community", or a profile page, or my activity feed), then the CPU usage drops to near zero, whether I leave the client window open in the background, or close/minimise it to taskbar.


I have just checked & observed the same issue on 2 very different PCs. Both Win10-64 v1803. But other than that, pretty much everything about them is different... different mobo manufacturers, CPUs, GPUs, RAM, even different Nvidia driver versions.
[EDIT: 2019-01 - both PCs are now on Win10 v1809, and drivers up to date, same problem still exists]


Is it possible there's some bug been introduced recently, perhaps with the web client / rendering engine or similar.

I've only noticed this recently. I can't say for certain, but it possibly started with one of the last couple of Steam client updates.


I've always had Steam default to open the Store page, and I certainly don't recall seeing any of it's processes use anywhere near that amount of CPU when the client window was left idle in the background, or when it was closed / minimised to the taskbar, or while gaming. Not that I spend all my time staring at the Task Manager! But I've been in there countless times over the years, and never observed Steam constantly consume that much CPU before.

As a workaround for now, I've set Steam to open to my activity feed, which at least means it isn't using any significant CPU in the background or when closed / minimised to the tasbar.


It does seem strange to use 10% CPU while effectively idle on a web page. If I open the same store front page in eg. Firefox, it can sit there idle & uses virtually no CPU on the same PC, so I would guess there's nothing inherently wrong with the Steam web page itself. More likely the Steam client?


Any suggestions? Any way to report this to the devs if anyone else can confirm the issue?
Thanks!

[YorkyPudsy]

UPDATE: Just some more info to report on this issue that I've noticed...

- go to any game's page on the store in the Steam client, and then start to play a video (preferably one with audio)
- close the Steam client window (so it minimises to the system tray)
- the video continues to play in the background

This does seem to indicate a recent change in behaviour for how the Steam client handle store pages, as closing the client window would always stop a video playing previously.

I guess that could be a clue to why the Store pages (especially the main front page) hog 10% or so CPU, even while the client window is closed.

But it's odd how the store pages consume so much CPU even once fully loaded & left idle in the Steam client (but they use virtually zero CPU if you open them in eg. Firefox, as I mentioned above).


Can anyone else confirm that their Steam client is using 10%-ish CPU if left on the Store page? But uses almost nothing if left on any other page, such as the community/discussions, or on the friends' activity feed.

This seems to have only started happening with a recent Steam client update. See my original post for more details.
Thanks!

[ElectroSalt]

same problem except that for me it happens when steam is minimized to system tray (i had no problems before)

[YorkyPudsy]

Ah, thanks! It's good in a way that someone else noticed this issue, found this thread & confirmed it's not just some specific problem with the two PCs I've seen it on.

And yes, I get the problem whether I leave the Steam client window open, minimise it, or even if I close/minimise to system tray.

The trigger seems to be which page you leave the client on... any Store page (especially the steam home page) causes me noticeable CPU use. If you navigate away to eg. Library, the CPU usage goes to near zero, whether you leave the window open or minimised/system tray.

This does seem to have been introduced somewhat recently, though I'd struggle to say exactly when... I'd guess sometime in the last couple of months, since I'm fairly sure I'd have noticed this kind of CPU usage at some point while tinkering with various games settings, optimising things, etc. if it had been going on for much longer than that, especially as I always used to have the Steam client default to the Store page (but I've had to change that to Library for now to minimise the impact of this issue).


Hopefully someone at Valve spots this, or someone else comes along who knows how/where to flag or report it so it can be addressed..?


Meanwhile, since my original post, I've updated both PCs to Win10 v1809, and the latest video drivers, and the problem still persists.


On perhaps a related note, I noticed recently that on at least one of those same 2 PCs, the UPlay/Ubisoft overlay was utilising around 5-7% CPU constantly while in The Division. I disabled the UPlay overlay, and CPU usage from the UPlay tasks dropped to near zero, in a very similar way to this issue with the Steam client (when I navigate away from the Store, to eg. the Library tab).

I mention that mainly because I noticed UPlay spawning multiple background processes, similar to the Steam "web helper" ones which are consuming CPU even while gaming if the Steam client is left open on a Store page (especially the front page).

I believe I'm right in saying both the UPlay & Steam clients use the Chromium Embedded Framework? If that's true, perhaps this is a bug in CEF, or the way it's been integrated, rather than something wrong with the Steam client itself.

[Viking2121]

Mine uses about 1% of my cpu left on store page, but i got a whole lot more cpu than you though, i7 5960x.

[Bob the Boomer]

steamwebhelper.exe i notice takes 1 core of my quad core system after leaving a game and trying to load the store page or others, i have to end the process for steam client to respond to any input

[MancSoulja]

https://i.postimg.cc/44wxF1Pj/SS.png

As you can see, this is not normal behaviour, my CPU is a little stronger than yours (6700K), but still, it's clear the bug isn't with Steam, or at least not with all configurations.

[Minos]

Yeah, this .exe can sometimes take 1 core 100% for nothing...
Today, it happens after login. So I kill the process then it's ok.
Not a long time ago it's doing this.

[YorkyPudsy]

Thanks so much for posting your experiences. It's interesting to hear that some people aren't being affected so much.

@MancSoulja in particular, does that CPU usage remain low even after you close/minimise the Steam client to the system tray? When I do that, I see the CPU usage briefly dip to nothing, then rise again (possibly a bit higher than it was while the window was open) as more steamwebhelper processes spawn.

Just picking some initial ideas out of the air here, but I wonder (if it turns out to be unrelated to Steam/Chromium), perhaps there could be some correlation with older CPUs & perhaps something like Meltdown/Spectre, and whether fixes have been applied/enabled, and the performance impact of those fixes.

FWIW both PCs I've seen the issue on (i5-4460 & i5-750) have fixes for both Meltdown & Spectre applied & enabled, but the two people above who don't seem to have such high CPU usage with Steam seem to have newer CPUs, which I presume might exhibit less of an impact from those security fixes, if they even have them installed & enabled?

Or maybe it's related to number of cores/threads. The 6700K that doesn't have the issue above is 4c/8t I believe? Whereas my 4460 only has 4c/4t. Could it be that the Steam client is spawning too many webhelper threads that are somehow blocking/tripping over each other on CPUs with lesser multi-threading capability?

Other than that, the two PCs with the issue here are using Nvidia gfx cards (970 & 950 respectively) & the latest drivers (though the issue also existed on drivers from a few months ago, v416.34), so perhaps there's some difference with AMD and/or different driver versions?

Any other ideas for potential areas to investigate/compare between ourselves, to try to narrow down a possible cause?

[Syad]

Video playback was always a ressource hog on Steam. Relatively speaking. My 10yo cpu ( 1st gen i-core) takes ~3% @1.7GHz cpu time playing a strorepage video. Ye.. Additionally i can NOT confirm the behavior stated in the OP. as of 14.01.2019 it drops back to 0% if the window is closed during playback. I can also see it by GPU utilization dropping too.

[YorkyPudsy]

Good info, thanks Syad! Especially re: the older CPU, so I guess that rules out cores/threads, and performance impact of Spectre/Meltdown (unless fixes aren't available/installed for you?), or anything along those lines.

Note that I'm getting this CPU usage even with NO video playing on a store page (I also have "autoplay" disabled), it was just that when I tried playing a video in my 2nd post above, I noticed the video continued playing even after closing the client window/minimising to system tray, and prior to the last couple of months Steam had never done that to me.

Here are some other things that I haven't yet mentioned in my previous posts which I've tried recently to narrow this down... (none have made any difference so far)

- deleted Steam's caches (cookies, web, download)
- wiped & re-installed Steam completely
- scanned with Malwarebytes
- tried Windows 10 "Game Mode" and "Game Bar" both ON & OFF
- tried various settings for Nvidia driver "vsync" in global settings (so it applied to SteamWebHelper etc.), ie. vsync=ON, OFF, adaptive

This only affects the STORE pages (particularly the home page) when they are open in the Steam client (or was the last thing opened in the client before closing/minimising to system tray). And opening those same store pages in Firefox doesn't cause this excess CPU usage (it's practically zero there). No other pages in the Steam client seem to trigger this constant CPU usage, not the Community, my Activity page, Market, Workshop pages, or anything else I've tried so far.

I'm starting to think this could be some setting, perhaps in Windows, that isn't playing nicely with recent versions of the SteamWebHelper or the Chromium framework it uses, and perhaps just with some particular element that is present on the Steam Store web pages (but not present on eg. the Community pages). That might make sense if it's a configuration which I have made on both of the PCs where I've observed the issue.

I'm loath to install Chrome, but I wonder if doing so (and visiting Steam Store pages in it) might give me some indication of whether Chrome/Chromium/CEF could be to blame.

I'll post back if I manage to narrow it down to anything specific. Grateful for any other ideas in the meantime. Cheers!

[Syad]

Not nessesairly, i have uninstalled all spectre or meltdown patches, my windows10 version is 1709 where it is still possible to not have them. Sorry for not specifying it. I was merely stating that closing the window stops whatever it was doing on my system. W/o videoplayback i have to report the same as MancSoulja, <1% of anything. If you are on 1803 anjyway i would do a total system update check. Maybe some codecs or drivers are missing.

[Syad]

Try to disable meltdown and some of Spectre patches using this utility first https://www.grc.com/inspectre.htm

[YorkyPudsy]

Ah ok, thanks again!

So, I've just re-tested on the i5-4460, disabling both Meltdown & Spectre with the GRC tool & rebooting for good measure. Perhaps there's a very tiny reduction, but...

If I open the Store home page in the Steam client, then close/minimise to systray, I still see about 8-9% total CPU usage on average across the several "steamwebhelper.exe" threads listed in Task Manager. The total figure bounces around a bit, but generally between 5-12%, sometimes briefly more, with the highest single task seeming to hover around 5-7% constantly.

That is with nothing else open on my system besides Steam, after a reboot & letting things settle down.

But as soon as I navigate away from the Store page, the CPU usage drops, and if I then close the client window, the CPU usage stays negligible.

And yep, both PCs with this issue are totally up to date after moving to Win10 v1809 recently (I put it off for a while after the widely-reported issues, which are apparently mostly resolved now), and then updating graphics drivers, etc.

Certainly something seems to have changed in the last few months. I'm just not sure if it's Windows, drivers, Steam, or some setting in one of those that I may have changed & forgotten about.

I'll plug away at it more as other ideas come to me. It's not really disastrous, as I've now set Steam to open on the Library page by default, which is fine, so long as I remember not to leave it open on a Store page while gaming.

Cheers for your help & suggestions!

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Mine shows ~2-3% CPU on the main store page due to the carousel switching games.

[YorkyPudsy]

Originally posted by cSg|mc-Hotsauce:

Mine shows ~2-3% CPU on the main store page due to the carousel switching games.

Thanks! Yeah that sounds about normal, and roughly how I think mine was several months ago.
And I assume it drops even lower if you close the window (so it minimises to the system tray) ?

Does anything stand out as different between your PC/setup & anything I've mentioned so far?

Quick recap...

• Two PCs with this problem are on Win10 64-bit Pro v1809 (was v1803, both had/have the issue)
  
• i5-4460/GTX970 + i5-750/GTX950
  
• Windows & drivers up to date.
  
• If I open the Steam client on the Store home page, multiple "steamwebhelper.exe" processes consume a total average of about 10% CPU continuously, and this persists even if I then close the window (minimise to system tray), whereas a few months ago the usage dropped to near zero when I did this, and I suspect was never near 10% even while open.
  
• It is only the Store pages that cause this. Community, Activity, Market, Workshop, etc all consume near zero CPU with the Steam window open or minimised to system tray.

Thanks!