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Shaerif's avatar
Shaerif
Copper Contributor
May 21, 2026

textinputhost.exe hangs after Win+C or Win+V and leaves a frozen panel that blocks all mouse input

I keep hitting a bug on Windows 11 where pressing Win+C (Copilot) or Win+V (Clipboard History) causes textinputhost.exe to hang. When it hangs, the panel stays on screen, frozen. You can see it, but you cannot interact with it or close it. Every mouse click goes nowhere. Nothing on the desktop, taskbar, or any open app responds. The keyboard still works, but the mouse is fully blocked by the hung panel.

 

The only way out is to press Ctrl+Shift+Esc to open Task Manager, find textinputhost.exe under Background Processes, and click End Task. The panel disappears and mouse input returns right away. But textinputhost.exe starts again on its own, so the same thing happens next time you press Win+C or Win+V.

 

STEPS TO REPRODUCE:

1. Press Win+C or Win+V anywhere on the desktop or inside any app.

2. Wait for the panel to open.

3. Try to dismiss it by clicking away or pressing Escape.

4. The panel freezes. You can still see it on screen but it stops responding.

5. Try clicking anywhere. Nothing works.

6. Press Ctrl+Shift+Esc to open Task Manager.

7. Find textinputhost.exe under Background Processes and click End Task.

8. The panel closes and the mouse works again.

 

EXPECTED BEHAVIOR:

After you dismiss the panel, textinputhost.exe should close cleanly and return full mouse control to the system.

 

ACTUAL BEHAVIOR:

textinputhost.exe hangs and keeps the panel on screen in a frozen state. It blocks all mouse input to every other window until you kill the process in Task Manager.

 

WORKAROUND:

Press Ctrl+Shift+Esc, find textinputhost.exe in Task Manager, and click End Task. You need to do this every time the bug occurs because the process restarts on its own.

 

SYSTEM INFO:

Windows 11 24H2. Windows Feature Experience Pack (textinputhost.exe). Affects both Copilot (Win+C) and Clipboard History (Win+V). Both use textinputhost.exe to render their panels.

 

Has anyone found a fix for this? Is there a registry setting or Group Policy to stop textinputhost.exe from hanging? Has Microsoft acknowledged the issue?

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