What is WebKit Web Content (Safari Web Content) on Mac?
By Junaid, maker of Taskglass · Last reviewed
Runs one or more web pages in a separate process for Safari and other apps that show web content.
Web Content processes run the actual web pages: their code, layout and media. Safari gives sites their own processes so a crash or malicious page can't take down the whole browser, and other apps that show web content (Mail, App Store, many third-party apps) use them too. In Activity Monitor these are often labelled with the website's address, which makes it easy to spot a heavy site. 'Prewarmed' and 'Cached' ones are kept ready to make browsing faster.
- Category
- Apple app
- Made by
- Apple
- Safe to quit:
- Yes
Shown in Activity Monitor as com.apple.WebKit.WebContent, Safari Web Content, Safari Web Content (Cached), Safari Web Content (Prewarmed)
Why is WebKit Web Content (Safari Web Content) using so much CPU or memory?
- A heavy website: video, games, ads or complex web apps
- A page stuck running scripts in a loop
- Many tabs open, each needing memory
- Extensions injecting code into pages
What to do
- 1Find the busy process (look for the site name) and close that tab
- 2Reload the page or close and reopen Safari
- 3Turn off extensions one at a time
- 4Force quit only the specific Web Content process; just that page will reload or show an error
Safe to quit? Yes.
Safe to quit: only the page(s) it was showing go blank or reload, and the browser keeps running.
Typical usage
Rough ranges on Apple Silicon Macs. Yours will vary.
- CPU
- 0–5% for an idle page; higher while video or scripts run
- Memory
- 50 MB – 1 GB+ per page depending on the site
Related processes
- SafariApple's web browser. Web pages themselves run in separate WebKit processes.
- WebKit NetworkingHandles network traffic for Safari and other apps that use WebKit to show web content.
- WebKit GPU (Safari Graphics and Media)Handles graphics, video and audio for web pages in Safari and other WebKit apps.
Part of the Taskglass Process Library