What Is Brother Status Monitor? Is It Safe to Disable at Startup?

What Is Brother Status Monitor?

Brother Status Monitor is a helper program installed with some Brother printer and scanner drivers. Its executable is usually brstmonw.exe, published by Brother Industries. It watches the status of a connected Brother device and can show alerts such as paper jams, low toner, offline state, or other printer messages.

It is not a core part of Windows. It is also not usually required for basic printing. In many setups, your Brother printer will still print normally without the status monitor running in the background, especially if you open the full Brother software only when needed.

Is It Safe?

Yes, if it is the real Brother file, it is generally safe. brstmonw.exe is a known Brother component and is not normally considered harmful by itself.

Because malware can use familiar names, still verify it if something looks wrong. In Task Manager, right-click the process and open its file location. A real copy is typically inside a Brother program folder under Program Files or Program Files (x86), not in a random user temp folder. You can also check the file's digital signature in Properties to confirm it is signed by Brother Industries or a Brother-related publisher name.

If brstmonw.exe is using a strange file path, has no valid signature, or appears on a PC with no Brother hardware installed, treat that as suspicious and investigate further.

Should I Disable It at Startup?

Usually, yes if you do not need constant printer alerts. This is an optional startup item.

Disabling it at startup normally just stops the background monitor from loading with Windows. It should not remove the printer driver itself. You may lose pop-up warnings about toner, paper, or device status until you open Brother software manually or start a print job.

Keep it enabled if you rely on status notifications, manage a printer that often needs attention, or use Brother utilities that expect the monitor to be running.

Why Is It Using High CPU or Memory?

Brother Status Monitor should usually use little CPU and memory. If usage stays high, common causes include:

• the printer is offline or repeatedly reconnecting
• a stuck print queue
• a driver problem after a Windows update
• USB or network communication issues with the printer
• corrupted Brother software

Try closing the monitor and reopening it, restarting the printer, clearing stuck print jobs, and rebooting the PC. If the problem continues, update or reinstall the Brother driver package from Brother's support site. If you do not need the monitor, disabling it at startup is a reasonable fix.

How to Disable or Remove It

If it appears in Startup, you can disable it without uninstalling the printer.

On Windows, check:

• Task Manager > Startup apps
• the Startup folder
• Brother entries in Task Scheduler

If you want to remove it completely, uninstall the Brother status or full printer software from Settings > Apps or Control Panel > Programs and Features. If you still use the printer, avoid removing the main driver unless you plan to reinstall it.

Where Kudu Helps

Kudu can show whether Brother Status Monitor is set to launch from a Run key, Startup folder, or Task Scheduler entry, then let you disable it without guessing. If it is using too much CPU or memory, Kudu's Performance Monitor can confirm that brstmonw.exe is the process responsible and link it back to its startup entry.

If the file location looks wrong or the behavior is unusual, Kudu's Malware Scanner can help check for suspicious persistence and quarantine confirmed threats. Kudu will not remove your printer driver unless you choose to uninstall software yourself.

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