Why is TurboTax so slow to launch?

[AndyMarty]

Maybe it's posted elsewhere, but the forum is hard to search. 

For years now TurboTax, particularly right after installation, is super slow to launch. The not so helpful and almost annoyingly taunting splash screen says "yes we know it's slow," but the performance never improves. What's up with that TurboTax? Why can't you make the app launch faster?

[tygrtchr]

The speed of the launch depends on the number of people accessing the TurboTax server.  The beginning of "tax season" and the week or so before April 15 are the busiest times of the year.

[DK14]

I'm running on a high-performance desktop. AMD 3700x, 32 GB RAM, 2 TB high-performance SSD and it takes 79 seconds to launch Turbo Tax (Run as Administrator).

I regret purchasing TurboTax.

[AndyMarty]

Does sever activity affect desktop launch time? That seems nuts. I am using the desktop version with Windows 10. Why would TT be going to the server just to launch a local app?

[kvee]

I purchased the CD version of TurboTax 2019 and it took a long time to install.     It still takes app forever to open.   And and now it keeps asking me to update it, and then freezes over and over.  

If I'm using this on my desktop I don't know why it would be on the Intuit server and it better not be.  

Perhaps the slowness folks mention is for those entering data on line.  

This is the worst Turbotax I've ever used and I've been using it for over 20 years.

[DonnaLO]

If you continue to have problems please contact Technical Support using this form: 

 https://support.turbotax.intuit.com/contact/ 

[munster1]

Same issues. so bad, help chat no use. The whole things is a waste of time. 

[DK14]

TurboTax 2020 now takes 105 seconds to launch! 

It gets slower and slower each year. 😩

[DoninGA]

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@DK14 wrote:

TurboTax 2020 now takes 105 seconds to launch! 

It gets slower and slower each year. 😩

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Must be a local issue.  I am using 2020 Premier desktop on a Windows 10 PC and it only takes 11 seconds to open the program and another 20 seconds to start a saved tax return.

[jce1978]

"Must be a local issue. I am using 2020 Premier desktop on a Windows 10 PC and it only takes 11 seconds to open the program and another 20 seconds to start a saved tax return."

Nothing local about it. My 2020 Deluxe desktop on a Win 10 PC takes 75 seconds to launch. TT tech support is useless. As someone else said, this gets worse every year. :(

[DK14]

Good to know. I simply have to pay an extra $40.00 to get a poor startup time of 11 seconds instead of +100 seconds.

I can start up Microsoft Excel 365 in less than 1 second.

[jce1978]

DK, sorry but how does your $40 get you a faster launch time? Again, I'm using the desktop/CD version in Win 10.

[ns30]

I agree, extremely slow. To the point it seems like a tactic to get you buy on of their upgrades. Im a CPA so I know how to file my tax return. What should have been 30 to 45 min process, has taken me 4 plus hours. It takes almost 30 to 60 seconds to load each thing. Will not be using this next year

[fanfare]

TurboTax uses JAVA.

When a JAVA program starts, everything you see or might see has to be initialized.

TurboTax is a hugely complex application. That's why it is so slow to launch.

If it is slow in operation, that shouldn't be,  something else has gone wrong for you.

[DK14]

I've spent 14 years developing enterprise-class Java applications. I would have been fired if any of my projects were so slow on startup.