Why does Outlook launch IE in the background?

I put together a permanent solutions to this issue but it seems to me like an excessive work around.

I tagged myself to this ticket hoping for either an update from Microsoft or a solutions from another user.

Summary:

This solutions involves a PowerShell script + Task Scheduler + replacing shortcut with modified shortcut

Yea, I know, it's kinda of an ugly solution.

 First step is to make a PowerShell script that will close any IE process that open up within a few seconds AFTER Outlook starts. This will prevent closing any legitimate IE processes that may have been running prior to opening Outlook. (LOL I couldn't say this line out loud with a straight face).

Here is my script

function KillIE()

{

& "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\root\Office16\OUTLOOK.EXE";

Start-Sleep -s 6;

$outlookStart = Get-Process outlook -IncludeUserName | where UserName -match $env:userName;

Get-Process iexplore -IncludeUserName | where-Object starttime -gt $outlookStart.starttime | where UserName -match $env:userName | stop-process;

}

Once you save the script then you have to create a Task Scheduler that will trigger when clicked.

Then when you are done, you have to make a custom shortcut that will run this task when clicked

Afterwards you can change the icon for the shortcut to make it look like an Outlook icon so that no one that uses it realizes that it is not the orginal shortcut.

This is messy but it gets the job done...

Thanks, J AlexVillasenor!

It's appalling that we should have to go to this length to resolve this issue with Outlook, but I've been getting increasingly frustrated at the poor performance of my machine caused by these rogue iexplorer.exe processes.

I've been running your solution for a few days now, and it has been working beautifully...no random iexplorer.exe processes most of the time! I do notice that from time to time, Outlook can re-open these processes (Seems to happen when I open a new window), but at least this takes care of the times that iexplore is opened at startup. It's less annoying to have to occasionally manually stop a stuck iexplore instance than to have to do it every single time I open Outlook.

I appreciate you taking the time to put this together and share it.

Respectfully,

Doug

TL;dr

Outlook starts two IE processes that shutdown when Outlook does: This is normal

These two processes don't shutdown: This is a bug, under investigation

These two processes are a huge perf problem: This is not normal.

Hey - Outlook Escalation Engineer (read: debugger) here. I just wanted to add some clarity:

Outlook (all of Office really) uses Internet Explorer to handle Office Add-Ins, as suggested earlier in the thread. Originally, we would launch IE right when we needed it to handle an add-in, but we found that sometimes IE could take a while to load. So we made a change: now we "preheat" the add-in architecture when we launch Outlook. We go ahead and launch IE to get it ready for when we need it.

This is why it doesn't matter if you're actually using any add-ins - we can't know that in advance, so we still warm up IE. And this is why IE will come back after you kill it - if you do an action that would activate an add-in you do have (like opening a message), we will launch IE.

This is also why those of you who have chosen to uninstall IE now find that add-ins don't work. You removed a component they depend on.

The design of IE also dictates that it uses a different process for every site opened, along with a master process for the user interface. This is why, if you have several tabs open, you'll see several IEs in task manager. So when Outlook launches IE, IE will in turn launch another instance, leading to the two you see in task manager.

The design for Office's use of IE for add-ins also dictates that IE is shut down when the Office application is shut down. I do understand that there is a scenario where this does not happen, and I'm investigating it.

Here's the problem - the APIs we use to talk to IE do not like it when Protected mode is disabled:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2761180/apps-for-office-don-t-start-if-you-disable-protected-mode-for-the-rest

https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/deva/2017/11/01/understand-more-about-office-js-its-add-in-runtime-environment-and-internet-explorer-protected-mode/

The scenario I'm investigating involves just that: Protected mode is disabled, Outlook launches IE, but IE does not shut down when Outlook does. That definitely sounds like a bug (though I'm not sure yet if it's on the Outlook/Office or IE side). I've got a repro here and am debugging it right now. So if your issue is that you get more and more IE processes as you start and stop Outlook, I hope to get to the bottom of that soon.

Finally: For those of you reporting that two IE processes are enough to tank the performance of your machine. I'm afraid you may have bigger problems going on. Outlook hasn't actually asked IE to do anything - just to be running so it *can* ask it for stuff later. I would take a close look at any Internet Explorer add-ons you have have installed. I would also be very concerned about possible malware. This thread does seem to highlight some Windows version related issues:

https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/office/en-US/de34e4b2-0c48-4486-ab75-0a54136748d1/outlook-2016-crashing-internet-explorer?forum=Office2016setupdeploy

Hi - We have been facing the same problem which Evan highlighted. we have updated the Office 365 , but still issue remain same , please help us to solve this problem as early as possible.

A great many users of Outlook 2016, etc are plagued by there being 2 instances of iexplore started, one being the 64-bit vsersion. Starting Outlook in safe made makes not the slightest difference. That was reported at least 2 years ago and still Microsft has not fixed it and no one on any of the relevant forums has a solution.

Outlook does not need to have IE running at all. In my case I open Task Manager and 'kill' both instances of IE with no detrimental effect on Outlook. I use other browsers as I dislike IE and, as I'm using Windows 8.1, I fortunately do not have Edge to contend with.

When will Microsoft listen to users and do something helpful?