For me, Epic Games Launcher averaged 0.09% CPU usage this year overall, including when not running, which imho is unacceptable for the functionality it offers. Extrapolating to millions of users I imagine there are quite a few power plants running just for it. Obviously this pales to UE itself. The difference is that Launcher doesn’t really do anything for me most of the time. I would like to start the Launcher by myself when I need it but don’t want it to run every time I start a binary version of the editor. Is there a more formal way to disable it other than renaming the exe or using taskkill on editor startup?
As a side note regarding posting a new topic in the forum: “You must choose at least 1 tag” for “optional tags” is an oxymoron.
Epic have been secretly using the Launcher to mine Bitcoin, and Fortnite is just a front for all that. Its the only explanation that makes any sense. Seriously try this below… Overall the Launcher is like Win10 / Win11 malware. Forcing it onto devs who just want to download MP packs is a human-rights violation. How much telemetry does the Epic-borg really need?
There doesn’t seem to be a windows startup key anymore. Editing com.epicgames.launcher… does indeed work, however launcher magically fixes this once started manually.
That’s annoying… Its always an arms race against any app that can change in a heartbeat and force updates or loss of control. Try running the Launcher on an account without Admin-Rights. Overall, my production dev rigs are all airgapped. I only run the Launcher on sacrificial boxes and only when absolutely necessary.
Its time there was a web-based alternative for downloading MP assets at least. Linux may offer more options too. There’s just no reason to let the Launcher run all the time. Managing assets can be done in other ways. Why not add your 2c to threads like those below. They may have higher-visibility, as Epic don’t follow the forums much…
The launcher has had an issue since at least2016 where it will consume nearly a full cores worth of CPU power if you leave it open to the Unreal Library tab. It was never fixed, to this day the launcher pulls high power on the library tab for no apparent reason.
When I used to run on a 6700k I could always tell when I accidentally left the launcher open because my CPU fan would spin up to max speed to remind me.
The launcher frankly seems to be falling into disrepair, the Unreal marketplace has been completely unusable from within the launcher for me for over a year, the main page loads but nothing happens when clicking on anything…
I can only hope a major update is coming in the future.
Seriously try this below… Overall the Launcher is like Win10 / Win11 malware. Forcing it onto devs who just want to download MP packs is a human-rights violation. How much telemetry does the Epic-borg really need? 
