CCleaner working, but freezes on startup cleaning

After updating CCleaner free to version 5.44, CCleaner freezes when starting cleaning. I checked the "run CCleaner when computer starts" option. The CCleaner icon appears in the notification area and says "cleaning" but it never actually cleans on computer startup. CCleaner works fine when cleaning manually if I open the program and run it from there. The other change I made from the default setting is unchecking "enable system monitoring". I have been using CCleaner for several years without any issues up to this point. Other information that may be helpful: I'm running Windows 10Pro 64 bit with the latest updates applied, and ESET NOD32 Antivirus (which I've also used for years) latest version.

just confirming.... when you updated CC you installed v5.44. the latest is v5.45

Correct, I was actually running 5.44 when the problem occurred. I have since updated again to v5.45. I did some more investigating using a laptop with the same configuration as the affected desktop (same OS, antivirus, settings), only with CCleaner 5.43. Everything worked as it should until I updated CCleaner to 5.45, and I experienced the same issue of CCleaner indicating it was cleaning in the notification area, but no cleaning was taking place. I uninstalled v5.45 and reinstalled 5.43 (from filehippo), and everything works again. Based on this, I would say the problem lies with v5.44 and later of CCleaner.

there has been a few issues with the last few releases.

myself, I will be staying on v5.40, with ccupdate.exe deleted and firewall rules blocking ccleaner64.exe but I find I only use it now to help give advice on the program's functions on this forum.

between my own batch script and MS's own cleanmgr with /sageset options all ticked I've weaned myself off its crap cleaning capabilities.

Please see the latest Beta release which should fix this issue