What happens if I end the explorer.exe process?

explorer.exe is taking up 2GB of memory. I don’t even know what it does, but is it safe to end it?

Solution 1:

It is "safe" to end it. Task manager has a special option "Restart" that may be preferable.

Explorer.exe handles your explorer windows as well as your taskbar/start menu systems as well as general file browser.

At best killing explorer.exe will close your file browser windows, at worst it will close your taskbar as well.

If when you kill Explorer your taskbar goes away then you can simply run explorer again from the Task Manager manu or Win+R.

Running it again should restore everything and your start menu will simply appear back the way it was before.