task manager uptime not resetting

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Why is the system uptime too long despite shutdown?

I'm noticing something strange in my PC. The Task Manager in my system displays my system uptime is around 3days and 1hr. I can honestly tell you that I have used the machine for just 10hrs this week.

I rarely put my PC in standby or hibernate as I don't have much work to do with the computer. I have tried shutting down for a few hours but still found it unchanged.

Is this normal? As I don't know much about the underlying concept regarding downtime/uptime.

• 1 If you use Windows 8+, Shutdown is actually logout and hibernate! –  Josef Aug 9, 2015 at 10:52
• @Josef I know about this but what's the difference between a full and normal shutdown. –  Ashwin Aug 9, 2015 at 12:06
• What do you mean by "full" and "normal" shutdown? –  Josef Aug 9, 2015 at 16:10

2 Answers 2

The task manager displays a system uptime of about 3 days and 1 hr.

I have used the machine for just 10 hrs this week.

The difference is normal.

The Windows system uptime is the difference between the current time and the system boot time.

It doesn't subtract any time the system has spend in a sleep or hibernate state.

Task Manager shows a piece of information called "Up time". How is this value calculated, and why doesn't it agree with the value reported by Get­Tick­Count/Get­Tick­Count64? Task Manager calculates "up time" by subtracting the system boot time from the current time. In other words, it is misnamed; it really should be called time since system was started. It doesn't subtract out the time when the computer was in sleep or hibernation. The tick count, on the other hand, counts only time that elapses while the computer is on.

Source How does Task Manager compute Up Time, and why doesn't it agree with GetTickCount? by Raymond Chen (Principal Software Design Engineer at Microsoft).

How do I get the uptime since the last sleep or hibernate?

I've modified the command a little bit to be more explicit and give you both pieces of information: Elapsed time since Windows booted (either after a hybrid shutdown, full shutdown or simple reboot or hibernation). Elapsed time since Windows resumed execution (after returning from sleep mode). NOTE: If the system didn't sleep in between, both times will be the same.

Source Windows 8 reports WRONG uptime (possibly total Hybrid-Boot uptime) by asm00

I have tried shutting down for a few hours but still found it unchanged.

You have Hybrid Boot enabled.

The legacy definition for uptime is the time that the computer has been running since the kernel initialized itself. Since hybrid boot is just a special type of suspend (there was previously suspend to RAM and Hibernate), it doesn't count as "shutting down", because the same instance of the Windows kernel is used.

Source comment to Windows 8 reports WRONG uptime (possibly total Hybrid-Boot uptime) by allquixotic

Hybrid Boot is a new feature in Windows 8 that takes the Hibernate feature we all know and love and improves upon it to bring us faster boot times. In your PC you have multiple sessions, more specifically you have session 0 which is reserved for the kernel session and session 1 which is normally your user session. In traditional implementations of hibernation when you click hibernate your PC takes everything that it currently has in memory (RAM) and writes it to the hiberfil.sys file on your hard drive, this includes both session 0 and session 1 data. With Hybrid Boot, instead of hibernating both sessions it only hibernates session 0, it then closes your user session. So now when you start your PC back up, it reads session 0 from hiberfil.sys and puts it back into memory, and starts a new user session for you. The result is dramatically faster boot times, with no effect on our user sessions.

Source How to Do a Full Shutdown in Windows 8 Without Disabling Hybrid Boot

The link includes instructions on how to do a full shutdown.

Further reading

The Old New Thing: Practical Development Throughout the Evolution of Windows by Raymond Chen (Principal Software Design Engineer at Microsoft).

• Your first link goes to Amazon? @DavidPostill –  Moab Feb 2, 2021 at 23:15
• @Moab Yes. It's a link to a book. –  DavidPostill ♦ Feb 3, 2021 at 7:25

I had the same issues. I searched around and realized that there's a setting called " Turn on Fast startup", if it is checked then the system uptime only updates when you restart the system rather than simple shut down.

If you don't was this and change uptime every shut down you can do the following: Control panel>> Power Options >> Choose what power button does there you will see a checkbox for Fast startup. If you aren't able to uncheck it click on "change settings that are currently unavailable" and you're done!

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Up Time not Resetting each Boot

• Thread starter ObsidianObelisk17
• Start date Jan 6, 2017

ObsidianObelisk17

• Jan 6, 2017

First off, this is in no way a major issue. It is a mild annoyance where I would say, "That's kinda weird," then forget about later. Anyway, the Up Time clock in Task Manager on Windows 10 is saying what I can assume is the total time my computer has been on since I installed Windows 10, while carrying over the time of each past up time. It's almost at 12 days now, but I've been turning it off and on sometimes several times a day. Does anyone else experience this or know of a fix/workaround? Again, this is no big issue, but I can bet a data center or server host would like the correct up time for their computers. I am running Windows 10 Pro with the most recent updates.  

bailojustin

Distinguished.

The time on your computer is not set correctly is that what you are saying? if you need the time to update and keep itself, than this is a problem with your CMOS battery and it needs to be replaced. This little battery on the motherboard is what saves the internal clock and settings on the computer when its off.  

[quotemsg=19115975,0,1837397]The time on your computer is not set correctly is that what you are saying? if you need the time to update and keep itself, than this is a problem with your CMOS battery and it needs to be replaced. This little battery on the motherboard is what saves the internal clock and settings on the computer when its off.[/quotemsg] When I was switching the motherboards I changed the CMOS battery to a new one, but the problem is in the operating system itself. The Up Time in task manager, under performance, then CPU, is showing the collective time my computer has been on including past boots. Normally, Up Time resets after a computer turns off, so if my computer was on for 6 hours, it would reset to 0 when I restart my computer, but this is adding to the time. I turned it off last night and turned it on today and its almost at 12 days of up time, which is incorrect.  

Win 11 Master

the uptime in task manager only resets if you do a restart, not if you turn PC on/off as usual Win 10 doesn't turn off like other Windows versions, it goes into hybred hibernate and is only sleeping after you turn it off. It saves half the data to ram and other half to storage so that when you start PC its super fast as half of the data already in memory. To stop it doing that and maybe have the "correct" uptime in task manager, turn off fast startup it also resets if you unplug PC. It resets if its turned off, the only time that happens is during a restart command, not a shutdown.  

[quotemsg=19116131,0,2007449]the uptime in task manager only resets if you do a restart, not if you turn PC on/off as usual Win 10 doesn't turn off like other Windows versions, it goes into hybred hibernate and is only sleeping after you turn it off. It saves half the data to ram and other half to storage so that when you start PC its super fast as half of the data already in memory. To stop it doing that and maybe have the "correct" uptime in task manager, turn off fast startup it also resets if you unplug PC. It resets if its turned off, the only time that happens is during a restart command, not a shutdown.[/quotemsg] In the past few weeks, I have switched out the RAM multiple times, turned it completely off, requiring it to POST, go through the bios, search for RAIDs, all the stuff my motherboard does each power on. Plus, I was on vacation about a week ago, and the PSU was powered off and unplugged for several days. I have also reset the CMOS multiple times by removing the battery. All of this stuff isn't because of this issue, I've just been messing around with it. I turn it off each night using the Power Off option in the start menu.  

EDIT: it seems it can remember it over a few days unplugged: http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3007139/shut-computer-cpu-counts-time.html  

[quotemsg=19117046,0,1844680][quotemsg=19116131,0,2007449]the uptime in task manager only resets if you do a restart, not if you turn PC on/off as usual Win 10 doesn't turn off like other Windows versions, it goes into hybred hibernate and is only sleeping after you turn it off. It saves half the data to ram and other half to storage so that when you start PC its super fast as half of the data already in memory. To stop it doing that and maybe have the "correct" uptime in task manager, turn off fast startup it also resets if you unplug PC. It resets if its turned off, the only time that happens is during a restart command, not a shutdown.[/quotemsg] In the past few weeks, I have switched out the RAM multiple times, turned it completely off, requiring it to POST, go through the bios, search for RAIDs, all the stuff my motherboard does each power on. Plus, I was on vacation about a week ago, and the PSU was powered off and unplugged for several days. I have also reset the CMOS multiple times by removing the battery. All of this stuff isn't because of this issue, I've just been messing around with it. I turn it off each night using the Power Off option in the start menu.[/quotemsg] I don't know if you did a proper cmos reset, But follow the steps to make sure you did. Remove the computer from the wall, UNplug the PSU. Hold the power button for 15 seconds remove the CMOS battery HOLD THE POWER BUTTON for 15 SECONDS, If you have CMOS jumpers, Jump them now. put the cmos battery back in boot up the computer. if this does not fix your problem, open cmd prompt as Admin, type sfc /scannow This is a system file checker  

its a windows 10 feature, its not hardware and SFC won;t fix it...  

Only fix is turn off fast start up or just ignore it as its not a real problem, Its just windows doesn't reset the timer unless PC is restarted. Windows updates will reset it as it does a restart to let them install. If you have fast start up on, and don't restart PC inbetween, it can be as much as 29 days between a restart  

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