Adobe Flash Player is necessary for an increasing number of online activities, everything from watching videos to loading certain webpages. When Flash begins to slow down, it can cause mounting frustration that shouldn’t get in the way of your Internet use. There are ways to determine what causes slowing or crashing in the Flash Player with Windows 8 so you don’t have to deal with this issue for long.

Troubleshooting for Adobe Flash Player

One thing to check is your Internet connection. A slow connection can cause Adobe Flash Player, along with many websites, to struggle loading. If you find that when watching an online video that the quality is low and is taking a while to load up, this may be a sign that your connection is simply slow rather than a problem with Flash itself. Try troubleshooting your Internet connection this way:

• In the task bar on the bottom of the desktop, locate your connection (usually it’s the icon of a single computer) and click on it
• The speed of a good connection will usually be around one megabyte-per-second. Many connections can go even higher these days. Check to see what yours is
• If the connection is slow, try moving the router you’re connecting to, or possibly turn it off and on again
• Speedtest.net is a good way to see your Internet capabilities and gauge what kind of connection you have. The service is free if you simply want to find out what’s going on with your network and can be found online

A typical connection test performed by Speedtest.

If the Internet is fine and you’ve tested your connection, the problem could be that you’re running too many programs at once. The more memory is taken up by other programs, the harder it is for Adobe Flash Player to run fluidly. By shutting down other background programs or Internet tabs, Flash doesn’t have to work as hard to stream video.

Remove Unwanted Add-Ons

Multiple instances of Flash can also make it more difficult to watch videos online. It helps to keep Flash limited to one tab in a browser or one window. If you close windows or tabs running Flash, sometimes Flash plug-ins can still be running in the background. Try removing unwanted or unnecessary add-ons and plug-ins from your browser:

• In your browser, go to tools
• Select where it says “add-ons” or “plug-ins” to view a list of what is installed for the browser
• Anything on the list that you don’t want or need should be easy to remove or disable with the click of a button

A list of add-ons installed for Internet Explorer, with the option of enabling or disabling them.

If you’ve exhausted these attempts at speeding up Adobe Flash Player, using solid antivirus and spyware removal should eliminate anything you can’t see running in the background that shouldn’t be there. A PC infected with viruses or spyware can cause Flash Player to have a hard time when invisible processes are running constantly.

One other solution to a slow Adobe Flash Player would be to check for updates released. When you install Adobe Flash Player for the first time, the option to receive notifications of automatic updates is available, but otherwise these updates are available directly on Adobe’s website. If updating isn’t necessary, re-installing the current version of Adobe Flash Player entirely may be in order. Re-installing the browser could also be a solution.

Like many online applications, there’s always the occasional problem that can occur with Adobe Flash Player. Troubleshooting and checking for commonly occurring problems can speed up Flash without issue.