Printing a Process List

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 2, 2016)

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When you use the Task Manager, one of the things you can do is to view a list of processes running on your system. At times there can be quite a few processes running, and depending on how you have the list sorted, it can update and change often. That makes it difficult to read the list of processes.

Why would you want to read the list of processes? Because you might want to search for information, on the Web, about what those processes do. That way you can try to figure out if all the programs running on your system are expected or not.

If you are into this type of "research mode," it could be very handy to have a printed list of those processes so you could study it out. (Plus, printed lists don't tend to "jump around" because they are not dynamically updated.) If you want to print a list of processes, you might think you are out of luck, because Task Manager doesn't have any printing capabilities. A screen capture is also out of the question, as the list of processes likely is longer than what you can see on the screen at once.

There is a way to get your printed process list, however. Just open a command prompt window and type the following:

tasklist > c:\process.txt

The tasklist command simply lists the processes running at the current time. The greater-than sign indicates you want the output from tasklist to be stored in the file that follows the greater-than sign. When you press Enter to execute the command, the file process.txt, stored in the root directory of the C: drive, contains a printable process list. Just load it up using a program such as Notepad, and you can print it any time you desire.

 This tip (7095) applies to Windows 7, 8, and 10.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. ...

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What is 2 + 2?

2016-11-04 15:27:54

Don Scott

When I tried your hint I got the following.
C:UsersDon Scott>tasklist>c:process.txt
Access is denied.


2016-05-03 15:10:24

jOhn

When I tried your hint I got the following.
C:Users|Johntasklist>c:process.txt
Access is denied.

Any idea why?
Thanks,
John


2016-05-02 13:09:07

Bhagubhai

Thanks ,I will try.


2016-05-02 11:07:47

PFL

I am using Win 7 Pro.
For me, click START (lower left corner of screen)
Find and right click COMMAND PROMPT; then click RUN AS ADMINISTRATOR.
Answer yes to DO YOU WANT TO ALLOW THE FOLLOWING PROGRAM TO MAKE CHANGES TO YOUR COMPUTER?
My settings may lead to some differences from what you will see, but the main point is to run the command as an administrator.


2016-05-02 10:01:28

Mike Holden

Got the command prompt, win+X, but get the following response: "A required privilege is not held by the client." Okay, now what?


2016-05-02 09:57:07

Mike Holden

It would be helpful if you would also explain HOW to open a command prompt to type the command in. This is not something we novices know by heart.


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