steamwebhelper keeps dying and restarting randomly

[sham1]

Your system information

• Steam client version (build number or date): 1733265492
• Distribution (e.g. Ubuntu): Fedora 41
• Opted into Steam client beta?: No
• Have you checked for system updates?: Yes
• Steam Logs: steam-logs.tar.gz
• GPU: AMD

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

After launching any game, steamwebhelper seems to crash randomly. It occurs most often at the start of a game session, however it can occur pretty much at any time. This causes the Steam client window to restart itself, in turn stealing focus from the game, making it necessary to manually switch back to the actual game window.

Looking at the logs, it seems to occur due to some renderer trying to render a notification window with invalid dimensions of 0 × 0, which maybe causes the crash. The unsupported ffmpeg pixel format might also contribute, although that's harder to say.

Example snippet from webhelper-linux.txt:

[2024-12-28 09:43:49] [1228/094349.462635:INFO:crash_reporting.cc(255)] Crash reporting enabled for process: renderer
[2024-12-28 09:43:50] Invalid browser dimensions: 0 x 0
[2024-12-28 09:43:50] [1228/094350.718492:INFO:crash_reporting.cc(255)] Crash reporting enabled for process: renderer
[2024-12-28 09:43:52] [1228/094352.161001:ERROR:ffmpeg_common.cc(959)] Unsupported pixel format: -1
[2024-12-28 09:44:20] [1228/094420.812347:ERROR:ffmpeg_common.cc(959)] Unsupported pixel format: -1
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] [1228/094422.916495:INFO:crash_reporting.cc(255)] Crash reporting enabled for process: renderer
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] Invalid browser dimensions: 0 x 0
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] [1228/094422.920927:INFO:crash_reporting.cc(255)] Crash reporting enabled for process: renderer
[2024-12-28 09:45:03] [1228/094503.003838:INFO:crash_reporting.cc(255)] Crash reporting enabled for process: renderer
[2024-12-28 09:45:03] [1228/094503.005842:INFO:crash_reporting.cc(255)] Crash reporting enabled for process: renderer

Corresponding log entries from webhelper.txt:

[2024-12-28 09:44:21] overlay_uid7644-'SP Overlay': Applying safe browser shutdown workaround
[2024-12-28 09:44:21] GameOverview_uid7644-'GameOvervi': Applying safe browser shutdown workaround
[2024-12-28 09:44:21] friendslist_uid7644-'Friends Li': Applying safe browser shutdown workaround
[2024-12-28 09:44:21] contextmenu_8-'Store Supe': WasHidden 0: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] contextmenu_8-'Store Supe': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] contextmenu_8-'Store Supe': WasHidden 0: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] contextmenu_9-'Library Su': WasHidden 0: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] contextmenu_8-'Store Supe': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] UB-12058711: Applying safe browser shutdown workaround
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] contextmenu_9-'Library Su': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] Browser - launching child process with: /proc/self/exe --type=renderer --user-agent-product=Valve Steam Client --user-data-dir=/home/jani/.var/app/com.valvesoftware.Steam/.local/share/Steam/config/htmlcache --crashpad-handler-pid=322 --force-device-scale-factor=2.00 --buildid=1733265492 --steamid=0 --valve-initial-threadpool-size=8
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] SteamBrowser-'Welcome to': WasHidden 1: (0, 184) 5120x2532
[2024-12-28 09:44:22] Browser - launching child process with: /proc/self/exe --type=renderer --user-agent-product=Valve Steam Client --user-data-dir=/home/jani/.var/app/com.valvesoftware.Steam/.local/share/Steam/config/htmlcache --crashpad-handler-pid=322 --force-device-scale-factor=2.00 --buildid=1733265492 --steamid=0 --valve-initial-threadpool-size=8
[2024-12-28 09:44:23] contextmenu_9-'Library Su': WasHidden 0: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:23] contextmenu_9-'Library Su': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:23] contextmenu_9-'Library Su': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:23] contextmenu_8-'Store Supe': WasHidden 0: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:44:35] contextmenu_8-'Store Supe': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:45:01] contextmenu_11-'Profile Su': WasHidden 0: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:45:01] contextmenu_11-'Profile Su': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:45:01] contextmenu_11-'Profile Su': WasHidden 1: (0, 0) 4x2
[2024-12-28 09:45:02] Browser - launching child process with: /proc/self/exe --type=renderer --user-agent-product=Valve Steam Client --user-data-dir=/home/jani/.var/app/com.valvesoftware.Steam/.local/share/Steam/config/htmlcache --crashpad-handler-pid=322 --force-device-scale-factor=2.00 --buildid=1733265492 --steamid=0 --valve-initial-threadpool-size=8
[2024-12-28 09:45:02] Browser - launching child process with: /proc/self/exe --type=renderer --user-agent-product=Valve Steam Client --user-data-dir=/home/jani/.var/app/com.valvesoftware.Steam/.local/share/Steam/config/htmlcache --crashpad-handler-pid=322 --force-device-scale-factor=2.00 --buildid=1733265492 --steamid=0 --valve-initial-threadpool-size=8
[2024-12-28 09:45:03] SP Desktop_uid0-'Steam': ERROR: https://steamloopback.host/index.html?LOCAL_HOSTNAME=darkstar&LANGUAGE=english&COUNTRY=FI&LAUNCHER_TYPE=0&CLIENT_SESSION=1735336040&IN_CLIENT=true&USE_POPUPS=true&IN_STEAMUI_SHARED_CONTEXT=true&PLATFORM=linux:1: ResizeObserver loop completed with undelivered notifications.

Steps for reproducing this issue:

The bug seems somewhat sporadic, occurring somewhat randomly.

1. Open any game & do something
2. The bug should occur at some point

[sham1]

And just in case, I'll note that I've also managed to reproduce this issue on a "native" install of Steam, so it doesn't seem to be solely an issue for the Flathub provided installation. I don't currently have the logs handy, but if necessary, I should be able to get a hold of those.

[sham1]

I actually did decide to actually go ahead and gather the native logs as well. steam-logs-native.tar.gz

The difference between this and the Flathub installation is that the steam client window eventually ended up not becoming visible again, but otherwise the logs look very similar with similar messages of Invalid browser dimensions: 0 x 0 and so on.

[KibaGasteiz]

I've been affected by this for weeks, sharing my webhelper logs.
webhelper-linux.txt
webhelper.txt

My PC info: https://gist.github.com/KibaGasteiz/f90ab0f1bd5509e4139fa99b79c1c067

[Bodyash]

I opened this issue almost 2 month ago:

Launch a game, steam crashes, but sometimes it's not respawning, or spawning random dialog windows, etc... Also stealing focus.

Disabling GPU acceleration helps btw.

#11449

[YamatoHD]

How do you disable hardware acceleration? Mine crashes in a loop, the only thing I can do is start it -silent and play whatever that was recent and tray remembers. And also remote play works

[KibaGasteiz]

How do you disable hardware acceleration? Mine crashes in a loop, the only thing I can do is start it -silent and play whatever that was recent and tray remembers. And also remote play works

[YamatoHD]

How do you disable hardware acceleration? Mine crashes in a loop, the only thing I can do is start it -silent and play whatever that was recent and tray remembers. And also remote play works

Whole interface is crashing in a loop unless I start it with -silent, so no steam windows for me

[kisak-valve]

Hello @YamatoHD, you could try completely closing Steam, then run steam -cef-disable-gpu from a terminal as a workaround.

[YamatoHD]

Hello @YamatoHD, you could try completely closing Steam, then run steam -cef-disable-gpu from a terminal as a workaround.

Thx, I tried this one already, also -cef-disable-gpu-compositing, webhelper keeps coredumping. Same with flatpak