After using Brave for anywhere between seconds and minutes, it freezes. When I try to open a new page using a keyboard shortcut, I receive a message saying, “Brave is unresponsive. Relaunch now?” I’m not sure what could have caused this issue. I performed a Windows restore to a few days before the problem began, but it didn’t help. I also disabled all add-ons and closed all open pages to determine if any particular one could be the cause, but to no avail. How can this issue be reproduced?
By relaunching the browser it will start happening again. I’m not aware of what the exact trigger is.
Expected result:
Brave Version( check About Brave):
Version 1.78.94 Chromium: 136.0.7103.60 (Official Build) (64-bit) Additional Information:
Is this on Windows 11? Did the issue begin immediately after updating to the latest Brave version? Any new extensions? Does this happen consistently, or intermittently?
Thanks for your reply, @steeven. Yes, it is Windows 11. I’m not sure when Brave was last updated, as it updates automatically. Otherwise, I have not made any new modifications to the browser or my computer prior to the problem. The freeze happens all the time, often within one meeting after restarting. I also set up a new profile in Brave withouth any extensions but the freeze continues there too.
But more seriously, I’d love to get some guidance. I’m very attached to working with Brave, and now I’m forced to use another browser.
I noticed that on some pages (a small percentage), the freeze doesn’t happen. On others, it occurs very quickly (like on this forum), while on some it takes a minute or so.
I’ve also been having a problem with frequent (every few mins of browser use, assorted websites) Brave “freezes” (usually lasting several seconds, non-responsive window & title bar, “high” power/CPU usage per TaskManager; oddly YouTube audio & video usually continues while the window is otherwise frozen) which clearly started with Brave’s May 1, 2025 update. And continued with the May 7th update. I’ll likely keep updating and trying Brave, hoping the issue is resolved.
Note that in my case Brave recovers on its own after several seconds, for each freeze. And I never get a “Brave is unresponsive. Relaunch now?” message.
I’ve had to switch to another browser, such as Chrome (using the identical Chromium Version 136.0.7103.93 (Official Build) (64-bit) to Brave, as of May 11), or Edge (using its latest 136.0.3240.64 (Official build) (64-bit)) or Firefox, since Brave’s momentary freezes are too long and to frequent to live with.
I’ve tried uninstalling several Extensions and disabling every one of the remaining ones in Brave. I’ve tried disabling “Use graphics acceleration when available” (freezes either way). I’ve tried reinstalling Brave. I’ve tried deleting all Brave’s browser history & cached data. No diff/improvement with any of those.
I have Brave’s “Automatically send diagnostic reports” enabled, but I don’t know what telemetry Brave’s authors are seeing when I occasionally use (with freezes) then abandon it.
I’m running on a Win10 Pro PC 2009 19045.5737, with 64G of RAM. I haven’t made the leap to Win11 yet, maybe before the end of the year.
I have the same version of Brave running on another Win11 PC where it’s not exhibiting the freezes.
I am running a RAMDisk where I redirect browser temp files (same setup for for several years, for Brave, Chrome, Firefox, Edge, …)
I’m sorry, I don’t know what to do with that. I found the “Preferences” file at the location you listed. Do I need to delete it (tested by renaming it–messes up all my settings so not desirable), edit it in some way to delete a problem entry, wait for an update to Brave, ???
