Why does Outlook launch IE in the background?

Sadly, after a few days, I have discovered that this does not permanently fix the issue. When Outlook starts, it still spins up two new iexplore.exe processes that cause my computer to perform poorly.

On the plus side, I can actually stop these processes manually now, which I couldn't do before. But it's still a pain.

Hi, all,

I've been having the exact same problem with Outlook 2016...two iexplore.exe processes are launched whenever I open Outlook, and then my computer performance tanks and basically becomes inoperable.

When looking at the Task Manager details tab, I noticed two things about the iexplore.exe processes that struck me as unusual...first, one of the two processes was only using about 60K of memory, while the other was using several megabytes. That wasn't too weird at first, but that same process was frequently changing status from "Running" to "Suspended" and back again.

If I ended these processes, they would just start right back up again.

I tried disabling all add-ins in Outlook, running in safe mode, but nothing worked.

I saw a tip in another forum (https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/office/en-US/de34e4b2-0c48-4486-ab75-0a54136748d1/outlook-2016-crashing-internet-explorer?forum=Office2016setupdeploy) suggesting a clean windows reboot might help. 

I was a bit nervous about doing the full clean reboot, so I decided to try a modified approach...I opened the System Configuration utility ([Windows]+[R] and type "msconfig") and changed the "Startup selection" on the General tab to "Diagnostic startup."

I then rebooted the computer and logged back in. I opened Outlook, but forgot to check whether the iexplore.exe processes were still running. Then I changed the System Configuration startup selection back to "Selective startup" and checked the "Load system services" and "Load startup items" checkboxes and rebooted again.

After this, I rebooted the computer and logged back in. Since doing this, whenever I open Outlook 2016, I get 4 (instead of 2) iexplore.exe processes running, but my computer runs just fine. I also noticed that all 4 iexplore.exe processes are using several MB of system memory, and none of them are toggling between "Running" and "Suspended" status. It's only been about 30 minutes so far, but it seems for now that this reboot process resolved the issue, and I am able to work productively again.

I hope this helps someone else who might be experiencing this problem.

Could we get an update on this issue please?

Thanks,

Kris

It's been almost a year since the original post! I'm experiencing the same problem, please fix this behavior.

Hey Evan,

I also noticed this issue when running CCleaner and it had to "close IE processes" when none were actively open.

I uninstalled IE by going to Programs and Features, clicking Turn Windows features on or off, and clearing the Internet Explorer 11 check box.

After doing this the Outlook "Action Items" tool stopped working (see below).

Based off of my observations the Internet Explorer process is being used for the "Action Items" tool in Outlook, which is intended to scan through an email and highlight possible action items. I suspect it is done for the same reason Apple's Siri uses remote servers for processing.

Hopefully this helps at least point to why the process is appearing.

Cheers,

-Jordan

Thanks, Jordan.  This is the best explanation that I have seen so far.

Hi Evan,

I have Outlook MSO (16.0.9001.2080) and windows 10 - The "Action Items" ADD-IN is disabled. And still have 2 iexplorer.exe background instance every time I started Outlook.

i.e - If I close and start Outlook 3 times, I can notice 6 iexplorer instances.

I dont think this issue is related to Action Items ADD-IN

Moreover I disabled all ADD-INs and still have iexplorer processes.

Regards.

Andrea