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DennyDe
DennyDe
Participant
September 25, 2026

Image Processor memory leak filling up physical SSD storage / Scratch Disk until Photoshop is closed

  • September 25, 2026
  • 3 replies
  • 24 views

Hi Adobe Team,I am experiencing a severe issue when using Adobe Bridge -> Tools -> Photoshop -> Image Processor to convert RAW files to JPEG (both when running an Action and when running it without any actions).The problem: Photoshop opens the RAW files but fails to purge the temporary cache from the physical hard drive (SSD) after closing each file. Instead of just saving the 10MB JPEG, it keeps allocating massive temporary virtual files on my physical disk storage (Scratch Disk). This ghost storage space is never released and keeps growing file after file, drastically reducing my available Mac storage in real-time. The only way to completely clear this space from my physical SSD and restore my hard drive capacity is to manually close Photoshop.This issue is completely halting my daily professional workflow. I am using a completely clean macOS install, with no backups restored.My setup:

  • Mac Model: MacBook Pro M1 Max (2021)
  • OS: macOS (Latest version)
  • Adobe Suite: Photoshop, Bridge, and Camera Raw (All updated to the absolute latest version via Creative Cloud)

As a paying subscriber, I expect a core automation tool like Image Processor to delete its temporary files from the physical disk immediately after a file is closed, as it always did in the past.Please look into this bug. Thank you.

    3 replies

    D Fosse
    Community Expert
    D FosseCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    September 26, 2026

    Well, to be honest, if those numbers are representative, that sounds like well within expected disk usage for any raster editing process. I wouldn’t even blink at this. Photoshop by design doesn’t release temp disk space - or memory - until you close out the application.

     

    This isn’t about the final file sizes. This is about all the data that has to be moved around in the process, which is usually a whole lot more. That data has to go somewhere - and the point is, to avoid time-consuming operating system requests for every single file, the memory space is just held and recycled as needed.

     

    Now, if the process kept eating disk space (or memory) without any check or limit whatsoever, to the point where the whole system choked, that would be a different matter. Then you would have a memory leak. But according to those numbers, you’re nowhere near that. You have to accept that some memory (real and/or virtual) will be occupied as long as the application is open. Again, this is by design, it is not a bug.

    D Fosse
    Community Expert
    D FosseCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    September 26, 2026

    This doesn’t sound normal. Can you locate these temp files and show a screenshot?

    ACR operates outside Photoshop’s address space and doesn’t use Photoshop’s scratch disk, it uses the system pagefile. So it’s relevant to see what kind of temp files this is - if it really is Photoshop scratch files, something’s wrong. Normally, scratch files are recycled as you go and they shouldn’t build up.

    A complicating factor is the GPU. I don’t know how much of this ACR processing is done in the GPU, but the GPU uses its own big chunk of system memory, and when memory runs low, it gets written to the system pagefile again. We’ve seen a recurring problem where, in some cases, GPU memory runs unchecked and ultimately fills the pagefile.

    Normally the OS should manage this and release/recycle as needed. If this happens during Photoshop processing (not ACR), a complete reset of Photoshop preferences usually fixes it.

    If this was me, I’d probably just uninstall, wipe all remaining settings and preferences folders for a clean slate, then reinstall. 

    DennyDe
    DennyDeAuthor
    Participant
    September 26, 2026

    I had already tried resetting all the settings, but to no avail.
    I decided to format my Mac—five years after buying it—solely for this reason.
    It didn't solve anything; the problem remains unchanged.

    Here is an example:
    I have 100 RAW files displayed in Bridge; I use the "Image Processor" tool to send them to Photoshop and convert them into JPEGs (sometimes adding a logo via an action).
    A folder containing the converted JPEG images is created, taking up, say, 2 GB.
    Let's assume I have a 100 GB SSD; the free space remaining is 95 GB.
    As soon as I manually close Photoshop, the free space returns to 98 GB—which is what it should be, based on the size of the files created.

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