QTop is a Windows desktop process manager designed to streamline process triage and management. It provides a clear overview of system processes through an expandable parent/child tree view, complete with icons, live statistics (CPU %, CPU time, memory, and instance counts), and categorization into Apps, Background, Services, and Windows/System. Users can filter processes using interactive pill buttons that display live match counts and total CPU usage.
Key Features:
Expandable Tree View: Displays all processes as a hierarchical tree with detailed metrics and icons for quick identification.
Categorization & Filtering: Organizes processes into predefined categories (Apps, Background, Services, Windows/System) with filter pills for efficient navigation.
Fast Search: Enables users to search by process name, PID, executable path, or service name, with keyboard shortcuts (F3/Ctrl+F) for quick access.
Detail Panel: Provides in-depth metadata, including command line arguments, user/session details, integrity level, and version information.
Safe Kill Options: Offers a graduated approach to termination—graceful close for apps, force kill with process tree termination, and PID-reuse protection—to minimize system instability.
Administrator Rights Required: Ensures comprehensive functionality across all sessions by requiring elevation via UAC.
Audience & Benefit:
Ideal for power users, IT professionals, and system administrators who need to manage processes efficiently. QTop helps users quickly identify, understand, and safely terminate processes, reducing the risk of system instability or data loss. Its structured approach and advanced filtering capabilities save time and improve decision-making during process management tasks.
QTop can be installed via winget for seamless integration into your workflow.
README
QTop
QTop is a Windows desktop process manager focused on quick triage:
find a process, understand what it is, and kill it safely.
What it does
Shows all processes as an expandable parent/child tree with icons, PID, category, CPU %, CPU time, memory, and instance count.
Categorizes processes (Apps, Background, Services, Windows/System) and filters them via pill buttons with live match counts and total CPU %.
Search by process name, PID, executable path, or service name (F3 / Ctrl+F focuses the search box, Esc clears it).
Detail panel with command line, user/session, integrity level, version metadata, and hosted services.
Kill with graceful-close-first for apps, force kill with process tree, PID-reuse protection, and an optional confirmation setting (Del / Ctrl+Del).
Administrator rights
The installer is machine-wide, and the app requires administrator rights when launched so that
process details and termination work across all sessions. The desktop app declares
requireAdministrator, so Windows shows the UAC elevation prompt.
Installation
winget install Code-iX.QTop
Manual fallback: download QTop-X.Y.Z-x64.msi from the latest GitHub Release and install it.
The release workflow builds/tests, publishes self-contained win-x64, builds QTop-1.2.3-x64.msi, creates a GitHub Release, and runs wingetcreate update --submit --no-open when WINGET_TOKEN is configured.
For automatic winget PRs, WINGET_TOKEN must be a classic GitHub PAT with public_repo scope.
The first winget submission must be done manually with wingetcreate new; automated updates take over once the package is merged into microsoft/winget-pkgs.
Keep the installer UpgradeCode stable across releases.
The winget identifier is Code-iX.QTop; the installer is self-contained and should not declare a .NET runtime dependency.