<![CDATA[Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts.]]>I'll start by saying that I know this question has been asked a lot but none of the threads I've seen have any answers.

Every few days/weeks an opera icon appears on my system tray - and when I close it, it appears again after a few days/weeks. I do not want this icon on my system tray and would like to remove it permanently - it's only purpose seems to be to launch and close Opera which seems pretty pointless.

My guess is that it appears after every Opera update, but that's just a guess.
I've tried:

  • Removing it from the list of start-up programs
  • Looking for it in the Services and Task Scheduler
  • Searching through Opera's settings
  • Searched through this forum, Reddit and a bunch of other sites

There seem to be a lot of people who have this issue but none of them had a valid answer.

Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/topic/36008/does-anyone-know-how-to-remove-this-annoying-red-o-opera-icon-from-my-system-tray-it-s-driving-me-nutsRSS for NodeFri, 14 Aug 2026 13:35:39 GMTThu, 24 Oct 2019 13:23:22 GMT60<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Wed, 29 Jul 2020 12:23:26 GMT]]>@jaxx0rr said in Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts.:

@itsmeray @donq both of your methods will not prevent it from starting again once its somehow reinstalled ... my method works 100%

I also took a look at the Start Up tab in the task manager and after you delete that registry key and reboot the opera app we're all hating on isn't even available to disable. Now that I've looked I can say with assurance that you did something wrong or you didn't open the registry editor as instructed. If you don't run it as Administrator and aren't logged in to Windows 10 with an account with Admin privileges my guess is the fix will fail. I would not advise as donq suggested that you delete it. I'm thinking I may want to take a look at it someday. I just don't want it running all the time and sucking up resources. Most of my Windows machines are virtual so resources are at a premium.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219462https://forums.opera.com/post/219462Wed, 29 Jul 2020 12:23:26 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Wed, 29 Jul 2020 12:11:03 GMT]]>@jaxx0rr said in Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts.:

@itsmeray @donq both of your methods will not prevent it from starting again once its somehow reinstalled ... my method works 100%

Worked fine for me. Not sure why yours would still run since when you remove that registry key there is nothing calling it to run any longer. I ran a search of the entire registry after removing that key and found nothing calling it. Also nothing in the start folder. Good luck.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219459https://forums.opera.com/post/219459Wed, 29 Jul 2020 12:11:03 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Wed, 29 Jul 2020 09:57:22 GMT]]>@jaxx0rr This was the first thing I tried, I even went as far as hunting Opera down in the Task Scheduler. This thing is resilient.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219449https://forums.opera.com/post/219449Wed, 29 Jul 2020 09:57:22 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Wed, 29 Jul 2020 09:54:16 GMT]]>@itsmeray I'm just about to try this, fingers crossed it works.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219448https://forums.opera.com/post/219448Wed, 29 Jul 2020 09:54:16 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Wed, 29 Jul 2020 08:59:54 GMT]]>@itsmeray @donq both of your methods will not prevent it from starting again once its somehow reinstalled ... my method works 100%

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219447https://forums.opera.com/post/219447Wed, 29 Jul 2020 08:59:54 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Mon, 27 Jul 2020 23:54:35 GMT]]>Click on the start button and type Regedit. When the Registry Editor (Apps) appears right click it and select run as administrator.
When the registry editor opens navigate to this location:
Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
Once the Run folder is highlighted its contents display in the right pane. Locate "Opera Browser Assistant" right click it and select delete. Ignore the scary instability yada yada message that comes next and delete that freaking file with extreme prejudice.
I hate that with each subsequent version of Windows while attempting to lock it down they have not only failed in some cases, made it easier to hack into in others, and pretty much all the time made it harder on the average user who shouldn't have to be, and doesn't want to be, bothered with this crap. I just did it to mine while typing. Rebooted works fine. Have a good evening.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219242https://forums.opera.com/post/219242Mon, 27 Jul 2020 23:54:35 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Mon, 27 Jul 2020 10:13:36 GMT]]>@jaxx0rr said in Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts.:

or you can just open the task manager then go to the startup tab and uncheck Opera Browser Assistant.

Additionally open Task Scheduler, find Opera Assistant Updater and disable/kill it. Also you may look for Opera Assistant folder under Program Files Opera main folder and delete it either.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219145https://forums.opera.com/post/219145Mon, 27 Jul 2020 10:13:36 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Mon, 27 Jul 2020 04:57:44 GMT]]>or you can just open the task manager then go to the startup tab and uncheck Opera Browser Assistant.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/219129https://forums.opera.com/post/219129Mon, 27 Jul 2020 04:57:44 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Does anyone know how to remove this annoying "red O" Opera icon from my system tray? It's driving me nuts. on Thu, 24 Oct 2019 17:51:45 GMT]]>In Opera, goto the URL opera://about and take note of the install path. Then, close Opera.

Uninstall Opera through Apps/Programs and Features in Windows. When uninstalling, choose to keep your data if you want.

Delete Opera's install folder if it's still there.

Delete all files and folders in "C:\windows\temp" and "C:\Users\yourusername\AppData\Local\temp". They contain old install/update files that might interfere with Opera's updater.

Remove any Opera tasks in the Windows Task Scheduler. The uninstall process should remove them, but sometimes not. There are separate ones for stable, beta and developer versions of Opera. If you're just trying to straighten up Opera Stable, you can leave the Beta and Developer tasks alone if you want.

Download the offline package Opera installer from https://www.opera.com/download. Launch it, click "options", set "install path" to "C:\Program Files\Opera", set "install for" to "all users", uncheck "import data from default browser", adjust the other checkboxes as you see fit and install.

That should do the trick. If it still doesn't and you chose to keep your data when uninstalling Opera, in Opera, goto the URL opera://downloads and delete all downloads that are broken/unfinished. I guess you could try that first before the other stuff if you want.

]]>https://forums.opera.com/post/186283https://forums.opera.com/post/186283Thu, 24 Oct 2019 17:51:45 GMT