Ctfmon.exe - What is it and how to Remove it.

You might have noticed a process with the name ctfmon.exe when opening the task manager wondering what it was doing and if it was malicious or harmful in any way. You might be frustrated with the ctfmon.exe process that just won’t stop opening no matter what you do. You remove it from the Startup items and it just magically reappears. So what is it?  If you have a computer which isn't too great in terms of its processing powers and the resources that it has. A genuine question is what exactly is ctfmon.exe and why is it always running in my system? Another serious question would be do i really need it and if not, them how do i get rid of it! Don't Worry Read this Post and you'll find out Everything about ctfmon.exe and how to get rid of it

What is Ctfmon.exe?

Ctfmon.exe activates the Alternative User Input Text Input Processor (TIP) and the Microsoft Office Language Bar. Ctfmon.exe monitors the active windows and provides text input service support for speech recognition, handwriting recognition, keyboard, translation, and other alternative user input technologies.

Do you Need Ctfmon.exe? 

Ctfmon.exe is a process which is used to control the computer via speech or a pen tablet, or using the onscreen keyboard inputs for Certain Asian languages like chinese which need huge Unicode Support. So, if you are using a Pen/Tablet for input (These are not modern Tablets but old microsoft style tablets for input) - you might need them. But almost no one uses these as a input device. So, if you don't need any of the Input or language feature for your windows, you can easily Disable it.

How To Remove Ctfmon.exe

This is the reason why you are probably reading this post. You have tried disabling it, Removing it from Startup but it returned magically. So, here is What is required to remove and Disable Ctfmon.exe from your system.

An Important Fact: Removing Ctfmon.exe from MSConfig does not disable Ctfmon.exe.  

 There are various ways of Doing it. If one does not work, please try another. So here is how to Disable Ctfmon.exe from your system

Remove from Office Setup

You can simply remove the alternative text input from Microsoft Office 2003 by just removing that feature in the setup. You should remember this in mind even if this is not going to help you because next time you install office, you can disable that easily.

If you have already installed Office, No problems. Here is step by Step instructions of Uninstalling Ctfmon.exe from your system

1. Quit all Office programs.
2. Just Go to Control Panel >> Add or Remove Programs  or Simply type Appwiz.cpl in Run.
3. In the Currently installed programs list, click to select Microsoft Office product, where Office product is the name of the specific Office product being used. It might be Something like Office 2003 or Office 2007. Find your office and Click Change.
4. In the Maintenance Mode Options dialog box, select Add or Remove Features, and then click Next. This displays the Choose installation options for all Office applications and tools dialog box.
5. Click the plus sign (+) next to Office Shared Features to expand it.
6. Click the icon next to Alternative User Input, and then select Not Available.
7. Click Update.
8. Thats it! You have Removed Ctfmon.exe. This works great in Windows XP and Vista. I haven't tried it in Windows 7 or Office 2010 but it should work. In nay case you have other ways to uninstall Ctfmon.exe

Disable Advanced Text Services

Here is how you can stop the application launching every time you boot your machine:

• From the Control Panel, go to Regional Options > Date, time and language
• Then click on Regional and Language Options
• Select the Languages tab and click Details
•  
• Click on the Advanced tab  
• Under System Configuration, check the box Stop advanced text services
• Click on Apply and validate with OK

In Vista, there is slight difference. 

Open Control Panel, choose Regional and Language Options and then find “Change keyboards or other input methods”.

On the Keyboards and Languages tab, you can select Change keyboards. Finally, You'll have a similar page as described for XP. Just check the box containing turn of advanced text services and Ctfmon.exe

IF Everything Fails

If Ctfmon.exe is being more stubborn than you thought it would be, don't worry we still have a trick under our sleeve. You can just completely unregister the dlls that run the alternative input services by running these two commands from the run dialog box one after another

Regsvr32.exe /u msimtf.dll
Regsvr32.exe /u msctf.dll

After running these steps make sure Ctfmon.exe has been removed from Startup as a precaution. Just type Msconfig on Run and go to Start Up Entries and uncheck ctfmon.exe

SO, That's it! Please Give your feedback and Any queries that you have. Thanks for Visiting