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theryanashford
Participant
August 12, 2025
Answered

Cannot open Large Project Files in After Effects

  • August 12, 2025
  • 4 replies
  • 411 views

I have been working in the same project file containing numerous compositions of varying sizes but minimal complexity for the past year without issue on my M4 MAX Macbook Pro until installing After Effects 25.3 last month which caused AE to freeze during every attempt to open or import it.  After trying all of the usual troubleshooting steps (reset preferences, start in safe mode, clear caches) I uninstalled After Effects and installed a previous version.  This worked and I was able to open the project file and continue work as usual.  After updating to macOS Sequoia 15.6 I tried installing After Effects 25.3.3 to see if the latest update might have remedied the issue but was met with the same spinning ball that never completes opening or importing the project.  I reverted to 25.2.2 but that version was no longer able to import or open the project.  I uninstalled all of the fonts in the Creative Cloud app just in case that might be the culprit but it did not make a difference.  I have now tried every installation since 25.0 but none of them have been able to open the project file.  Does anyone know any tricks for this situation?

Correct answer theryanashford

I had some success at last and was able to open the project file!  I hope this will be helpful for anyone struggling with a similar issue.  My 108MB project file opened without incident after I reverted back to After Effects 25.2.2 *AND* reverted back to Premiere Pro 25.2

4 replies

2
2086
Participant
August 28, 2025

Maybe you should try this. Open the macOS fontbook app, ban all the third-party ones (right click My Fonts) and retry opening the large project. Then activate your fonts after a successful launch. This fixed mine, after trying a lot of other efforts. Really weird and i can't locate which fonts make the problem. Hope can help someone.

T
theryanashfordAuthorCorrect answer
Participant
August 12, 2025

I had some success at last and was able to open the project file!  I hope this will be helpful for anyone struggling with a similar issue.  My 108MB project file opened without incident after I reverted back to After Effects 25.2.2 *AND* reverted back to Premiere Pro 25.2

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theryanashfordAuthor
Participant
August 12, 2025

I should note that the After Effects project file does not have anything dynamically linked with Premiere Pro at all and the workflow does not involve Premiere in any way but I noticed in activity monitor that PPro Headless was actively trying to process something during the hang time while attempting to open the project file so I figured there must be some shared tooling under the hood and tried rolling back that installation as well.

Kevin J. Monahan Jr.
Community Manager
Kevin J. Monahan Jr.Community Manager
Community Manager
August 12, 2025

Hi,

Thanks for the message. Can you give us full details about your system, including external hard drives you are using? Are they formatted with FAT32, for example? I hope we can help you. 

 

Thanks,
Kevin

 

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community and Engagement Strategist – Adobe Pro Video and Audio
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theryanashfordAuthor
Participant
August 12, 2025

I forgot to note that I am able to open small project files under 20MB in size but cannot open any which are larger than that.

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Community Expert
RobShultzCommunity Expert
Community Expert
August 12, 2025

Unfortunately upgrading the app during a project may cause some unexpected results. Can you find a version in your auto save folder which may be old enough to open in a previous version?

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theryanashfordAuthor
Participant
August 12, 2025

Earlier saves (both autosave and backups) will not open unless they are very small project files.

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