Guide

How to close every "Not responding" app at once on Windows

Published 23 October 2026

A dark Windows PowerShell window listing apps that are not responding

Short answerRun Get-Process filtered on Responding to list frozen apps, then pipe the same list to Stop-Process -Force to close them all. Restart a frozen taskbar with Stop-Process -Name explorer, or Ctrl+Shift+Esc > Run new task > explorer.

Three windows frozen, "Not responding" everywhere, and Task Manager is slow to open? Two lines find and close them all.

Step 1: See which apps are frozen

PowerShell

Get-Process | ? { -not $_.Responding } | select Name, Id

Example output

Name              Id
SystemSettings 23836

Windows asks every app with a window if it is still answering. The ones that aren't are listed.

Settings, Photos or other Store apps can show up even when nothing is wrong: Windows pauses them in the background to save power. Closing them is harmless.

Step 2: Close them all

Give frozen apps a minute first. Sometimes they are just busy. Then:

PowerShell

Get-Process | ? { -not $_.Responding } | Stop-Process -Force

Anything unsaved in those apps is lost. Apps running as administrator can only be closed from PowerShell opened as administrator.

Restart Explorer, which draws the taskbar, Start menu and File Explorer:

PowerShell

Stop-Process -Name explorer -Force

Windows normally starts it again within a few seconds. If the taskbar doesn't come back, press Ctrl+Shift+Esc, choose Run new task, type explorer and press Enter.