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sophiewillox
Participating Frequently
Sep 24, 2025 9:11 AM UTC
Needs More Info

Premiere Pro Stuck on “Preparing Audio”

Hi all,

 

I’m running into a really persistent issue with Premiere Pro: whenever I hit play, it just hangs on “Preparing audio” for a long time and won’t start playback.

Here’s what I’ve already tried (with no success):

  • Reinstalled Premiere Pro

  • Updated GPU (NVIDIA Studio driver)

  • Set Audio Hardware > Default Input = None (helped once, but the problem came back next day and now wont work again)

  • Cleared Media Cache (both in Preferences and manually from AppData)

  • Moved Media Cache to a fast SSD

  • Disabled/uninstalled extra audio devices (Dolby APO, NVIDIA/AMD HDMI drivers) so only Realtek(R) Audio is active

  • Reset Preferences and Plugin Cache (Alt + Shift launch)

  • Renamed Documents\Adobe\Premiere Pro\[version] folder to force a new profile

 

It does it track by track and takes about 20 minutes each, the video is 1 hour 30 with multiple audio tracks, the footage is Proxy. 

 

Really not sure if its a Premiere issue, or a Windows Issue. Everything is up to date, its just very frustrating as I need it for my job! Any fix or suggestions would be massively appreciate. Thanks so much

Sophie

    10 replies

    dave_beaty
    Inspiring
    Jul 28, 2026 3:20 PM UTC

    I am running into this same issue on my 10 Core Intel iMac on Sonoma.  I am running the latest PPro 25 and have a 30 sec timeline with various audio clips and music. When I export it shows Rendering Required Audio Files and started at 31 hours estimated remaining.  I turned off render waveforms, and turned on the render audio using multithreaded - no change.  Also tried disabling all audio before export. No Change.  Last time I left it and when I returned it had crashed PPro. 

    One thing that did seem to work was copying the entire sequence all clips and pasting into a new sequence. Then rebuilding the effects sends in the Audio Mixer. 

     

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    dave_beaty
    Inspiring
    Jul 28, 2026 3:22 PM UTC

    I also deleted all the Audio PRV folders for this project. No Change.  Another window I get on Render. 

     

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    Edward Scissors
    Participating Frequently
    Nov 10, 2025 1:38 PM UTC

    After various bits of trouble shooting turning off Generate wavefore on import seems to have resolved things for the time being.

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    Edward Scissors
    Participating Frequently
    Nov 10, 2025 11:17 AM UTC

    I'm ahving the same problem. Mac Studio m3 Ultra has ground to a halt preparing audio for a new project. Yes lots of interviews but ita taking ages and making Premiere unusable. All footage and scratch disks running off a hiugh speed RAID via TB4

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    jamieclarke
    Community Manager
    jamieclarkeCommunity Manager
    Community Manager
    Sep 25, 2025 12:37 PM UTC

    Hi @sophiewillox - Can you navigate to C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Common and move the folders "Peak Files" and "PTX" folders out of the common folder. same with your external hard drive.

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    sophiewilloxAuthor
    Participating Frequently
    Sep 25, 2025 10:46 AM UTC

    Same issue unfortuently

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    Sophie
    jamieclarke
    Community Manager
    jamieclarkeCommunity Manager
    Community Manager
    Sep 24, 2025 2:44 PM UTC

    Hi @sophiewillox - Can you check version 25.5 and let us know if you are still having issues.

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    sophiewilloxAuthor
    Participating Frequently
    Sep 24, 2025 1:47 PM UTC

    For some reason this reply won't send so here's a screenshot instead! 

     

     

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    Sophie
    sophiewilloxAuthor
    Participating Frequently
    Sep 24, 2025 1:40 PM UTC

    Following from last message I had Generate waveforms automatically during import ticked but not and Generate waveforms and conform audio using multithreading

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    Sophie
    jamieclarke
    Community Manager
    jamieclarkeCommunity Manager
    Community Manager
    Sep 24, 2025 12:32 PM UTC

    Hi @sophiewillox -  Thanks for submitting your bug report. We need a few more details to try to help with the issue.
    Please see, How to Report a Problem.

     

    Can you post your system specs from the link above.

    What version of Premiere Pro are you using?

     

    In your Preferences > Audio do you have "Generate waveforms automatically during import" and "Generate waveforms and conform audio using multithreading" checked?

     

    You say you moved your media cache to a different drive did you delete your old media cache?


    Sorry for the frustration.

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