Windows 11 default desktop Chat/Teams widgets are Edge web views that eat up hundreds of MB of memory: https://archive.is/pyvEO
Edge also preloads in the background even if it's not the default browser: https://archive.md/AAjz4
Both links also detail how to disable these "features."
I was never a big fan of KDE , more of a Cinnamon guy.
I will probably buy a new disk to install W11 for gaming reasons and keep on doing everything else on Mint.