4 Ways To Change Priority In Task Manager On Windows

When you run applications via Windows PC, the processor allocates some resources to those applications. And these resources can vary from one process to another because your system has limited resources. Hence, Windows assigns a priority level for every program which determines the amount of power being granted. 

So, the higher the priority level to the process, the more resources it gets, and the smoother it runs. However, the priority levels assigned to various processes are different but you can change the priority of a process.

In this article, we’ll give you all the ways you can change the priority of a process. Keep reading!

How To Change Priority In Task Manager?

Before jumping into the methods, let’s gain some basic knowledge about priority levels. You’ll have six priority levels available in the Windows OS. Find them listed below:

1. Realtime
2. High
3. Above Normal
4. Normal
5. Below Normal
6. Low

Keep in mind that Normal is the default level at which almost every program runs without any problems. But, you have the option of changing the process priorities to speed up the process or slow them down to make sure they consume fewer resources. 

Note: The new priority level that you apply to an app or a process will stay in effect until the process is running. Once it stops, the next time you open it, it will open with its original default priority level only. However, if the app has a setting that allows it to change its priority automatically, it won’t start with the default priority.

There are some processes and apps that can change their priority level on their own. For example, WinRAR and 7-Zip can change their priority level to Above normal to speed up the archiving procedure.

Solutions to Change priority in Task Manager on your system:

1. Change Priority From Details Tab Of Task Manager
2. Change Priority Using Command Prompt
3. Change Process Priority Via Powershell
4. Start The Application With A Set Priority

1. Change Priority From Details Tab Of Task Manager

This is one of the easiest methods to set the priority of a process in Task Manager

1. Press the Ctrl + Shift + Esc keys to start Task Manager
2. Go to the Details tab, right-click on the process for which you want to change the priority.

3. Click on Set priority and choose any value that you wish.

4. Once the confirmation dialog box comes up, click on Change priority.

2. Change Priority Using Command Prompt

You can also change the priority level of a process by using the Command Prompt. Follow the steps given below to do so:

1. Go to the Windows search bar and type in “Command prompt”. Click on Run as administrator to open the command prompt with elevated permissions.
2. Type in the following command in the Command Prompt and press the Enter key:

wmic process where name="ProcessName" CALL setpriority "PriorityLevelName"

Don’t forget to write the name of the process for which the priority is to be changed in place of “ProcessName”. Also, change the “PriorityLevelName” accordingly. For example, you can change the process name to firefox.exe and the priority level name to Above Normal.

You can also set the priority with a numerical value:

wmic process where name="firefox.exe" CALL setpriority 32768

3. Make sure that the process has been running beforehand. Otherwise, the command will not work. 

For your reference, here is the list of priority values:

• Realtime: 256
• High: 128
• Above normal: 32768
• Normal: 32
• Below normal: 16384
• Low: 64

3. Change Process Priority Via Powershell

Yet another way to change the priority level of a process in Windows 10 is via PowerShell. But you need to know the designated IDs of different priority levels. Here is the list of all the ID codes for different priority levels:

• Realtime: 256
• High: 128
• Above Normal : 32768
• Normal: 32
• Below Normal: 16384
• Low: 64

Given below are the steps you need to follow to change the process priority from Powershell:

1. Press the Windows + X keys and click on Windows PowerShell (Admin)
2. Once the PowerShell window starts and enter the following command:

Get-WmiObject Win32_process -filter 'name = "ProcessName.exe"' | foreach-object { $_.SetPriority(PriorityLevelID) }

3. Make sure to replace the name of the process and its priority level as you require.
4. Start The Application With A Set Priority

1. Open the Command Prompt
2. Run the following command in the command prompt:

start "" /PriorityLevelName "Full path of application file"

Replace “PriorityLevelName” with the name of the priority level (say, “AboveNormal”) and replace “Full path of the application file” with the actual path of the app.

For example: start “” /AboveNormal ” C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe

This command will start the Firefox application with the Above Normal priority. In the same way, you can start the process with any priority level and the path entered should be correct. 

3. If you want to create a shortcut that opens the application with the set priority always, enter the following command:

cmd /c start "" /PriorityLevelName "Full path of application file"

4. When you are finished executing the command, close the command prompt window.

How Do I Permanently Change Priority In Windows 10?

1. Create a shortcut for the process concerned.
2. Go to the location of the shortcut. Right-click on it and click on Properties.
3. Add the following part to the beginning of the Target box:

%windir%\system32\cmd.exe /c start /high

For example, adding the above text to notepad’s shortcut transforms it into:

%windir%\system32\cmd.exe /c start /high %windir%\system32\notepad.exe

4. Click on Next and give the shortcut a name. 
5. Click on Finish.

Final Words

That’s all from our side on how to change the priority of a process in Windows. We have given you 4 detailed methods to set the priority levels of the processes and tasks manually. We hope the above ways have been helpful to you.