3 ways to restart Steam

Steam has been a joy for PC gamers for decades, but it's not perfect. Sometimes you'll encounter problems that can be fixed with a quick reboot on Steam. So if you want to restart Steam, here are some quick and easy ways to do it.

1. How to restart the Steam PC application

If Steam is currently open, the fastest way to close it is to click Steam > Exit in the top bar of the app. Steam will automatically pause all downloads and then shut itself down.

3 ways to restart Steam Picture 1

You may want to click the X in the top right to close Steam. However, clicking this will not close Steam properly; it just minimizes the client to your taskbar. Closing Steam via the client menu will completely terminate the process and allow you to restart properly.

2. How to restart Steam using Windows Taskbar

If you can't easily access the Steam client, you can restart it using the taskbar. Expand the taskbar if necessary, right-click the Steam icon and tap Exit Steam.

3 ways to restart Steam Picture 2

3. How to restart Steam using Task Manager

If Steam background processes persist even after you have completely closed the client, you can try stopping them through Task Manager.

To do this on Windows, open Task Manager with Ctrl + Shift + Esc and look for the Steam process. Right click on it and select End Task.

You can also do this when the Steam desktop app is frozen or unresponsive.

3 ways to restart Steam Picture 3

Restarting Steam is a good starting point when diagnosing strange problems you're having with the app. This is easy to do and sometimes is all that is needed to get Steam working again. Just remember to close Steam properly through the above methods instead of clicking the X at the top right of the app.

Kareem Winters

Update 18 February 2024