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I have seen the -K flag in almost every (if not actually all) svchost processes regardless of the service it loads.

It is always in the following format:

[path\]svchost.exe -k group

Searching google didn't give the exact answer I was looking for, so trying my luck here.

What does the -K means?

Knightwish
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    It specifies the group name. Useful to, later, add more services to the same svchost process. This is getting irrelevant, the current Win10 version of svchost no longer hosts multiple services in one svchost process. Pretty visible in Task Manager btw, lots of svchost.exe processes. – Hans Passant Nov 27 '19 at 11:00

1 Answers1

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-k is just used to specify the group name which svchost needs to start, as far as i know it's the only flag that you can set.

I suspect it's either a leftover from previous versions or a flag used to "future proof" development if more flags are going to be needed.

John Doe
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  • It isn't the only flag you can set, there is at least also -k and -p (ref: https://nasbench.medium.com/demystifying-the-svchost-exe-process-and-its-command-line-options-508e9114e747) – Nico May 18 '21 at 12:28