Firefox mystery in memory

[JohnnyGuitar]

Hey all. First post. My computer was bogging down big time on my W10 desktop. Happened before, too. I opened task manager and firebox was consuming gobs of memory. I expanded the folder. At the time, I had three browser windows opened with a total of seven tabs, but the folder showed nine, with two of them with hefty appetites. I closed the one using the most memory, then checked to see which tab had been deep-sixed. None! Any idea why Firefox seems to create what I'll call phantom tabs, and what they might be up to - other than jamming my machine?

Thanks much,

Johnny G.

[DanRaisch]

Firefox may run multiple processes even with only one window with one tab open. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/doc ... ss_Firefox

The memory consumption may be due to an installed extension. Have you tried starting Firefox in Mozilla Safe Mode? http://kb.mozillazine.org/Safe_mode
If no improvement using Safe Mode, do you have the same problem if you create a new profile and test it with no extensions or non-default themes installed?
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_Manager
and
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Creating_a_ne ... on_Windows

[therube]

gobs

How much is "gobs"?
Also what was CPU usage at that time.

(Somewhat related, Why so slow? Why so memory-hungry?)

[Tushman]

Hey all. First post. My computer was bogging down big time on my W10 desktop. Happened before, too. I opened task manager and firebox was consuming gobs of memory. I expanded the folder. At the time, I had three browser windows opened with a total of seven tabs, but the folder showed nine, with two of them with hefty appetites. I closed the one using the most memory, then checked to see which tab had been deep-sixed. None! Any idea why Firefox seems to create what I'll call phantom tabs, and what they might be up to - other than jamming my machine?

Thanks much,

Johnny G.

I agree with the other poster. How much is "gobs of memory"? Give us a number. Even an approximate one will do.

The amount of memory varies depending on the website you're visiting. Not all websites are created equally. If you suspect that Firefox is misbehaving, you should do a side-by-side comparison using another browser on the same computer using the same exact website.

Any installed add-ons will also use up some memory so when you do the side-by-side comparison, you should do so in safe mode.