Sudden 4x-5x increase in render times on AMD system (RX 6800 XT / Ryzen 7500F)

Hi everyone,

I’m facing a major issue with rendering performance that started about 1–2 months ago. I’ve been working for the same company for several years with a consistent workflow and project complexity, but lately, rendering has become a nightmare.

Projects that used to take under 10 minutes to export now take 40+ minutes. The performance seems inconsistent and unpredictable, even though the source files and effects remain the same as before. I am NOT using any third-party plugins.

Troubleshooting steps I’ve already taken:

1. Performed a clean reinstall of the Adobe ecosystem using the Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner Tool.
2. Tried rolling back to previous versions of Premiere Pro/Media Encoder.
3. Did a clean GPU driver install using DDU in Safe Mode.
4. Tested multiple driver versions, including the latest Adrenalin 26.3.1 and an older stable version from September 2025.

None of these steps resolved the issue. It feels like hardware acceleration is either failing or not being utilized properly, despite being enabled in the settings.

My System Specs:

• AMD Ryzen 5 7500F (6-Core, up to 4850 MHz)
• Asus Prime B650M-K
• 32GB (2x16GB) Kingston Fury DDR5-5600
• AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT (16GB VRAM)
• Windows 11 Home Single Language
• AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition 26.3.1 (Released 03/03/2026)

Has anyone encountered similar issues with AMD cards recently? Any advice on what else I should check (BIOS settings, Windows updates, etc.) would be greatly appreciated.

Sequence Settings (Source):

• Resolution: 1920х1080 (Full HD)
• Pixel Aspect Ratio: Square Pixels (1.0)
• Frame Rate: 23.976 fps
• Color Space: Rec. 709
• Field Order: Progressive
• Duration: 00:37:24:05
• Audio: 48000 Hz | Stereo

Export Settings (Output):

• Video Settings Format: H.264
• Encoding: Hardware Encoding (AMD Codec)
• Resolution: 1920х1080
• Frame Rate: 23.976 fps
• Field Order: Progressive
• Color Space: Rec. 709 (203 nits / 75% HLG, 58% PQ) 
• Bitrate Encoding: VBR (Variable Bit Rate), 1-pass
• Target Bitrate: 8.00 MbpsEstimated 
• File Size: 2336 MB
• Audio Settings Format: AAC
• Bitrate: 320 kbps
• Sample Rate: 48 kHz
• Channels: Stereo

Media File Properties:

• File Type: MPEG Movie (.mp4)
• File Size: 124.78 MB
• Image Size: $640 \times 360$
• Frame Rate: 25.00 fps
• Field Type: No Fields (Progressive Scan)
• Pixel Aspect Ratio: 1.0
• Color Space: Rec. 601 (PAL)
• Video Codec Type: MP4/MOV H.264 4:2:0
• Total Duration: 00:37:22:21
• Audio Format: 48000 Hz — Compressed — Stereo (Project: 32-bit floating point)
• Alpha: None
• Input LUT: None