Illustrator 30.0 lagging and still lags when i install earlier versions

if you did a save command and illustrator did not crash. The files will be there. What is the exact path to your standard save location? Are you certain you have not been saving to the Adobe cloud?  
 

In over 38 years of using illustrator, have never lost more than one file. Only file I lost was crashing before saving. so I need to see the exact folder path you are saving to to be able to help. also try doing a fine on your Mac to see if you can find one of the files I have seen people have the same two folder names. or maybe they were saving to their documents folder and s folder inside of that. 

I used Option + Command + Shift!--tgqphd|[]--> (Mac) while restarting Illustrator, and it seemd to clear it up. however, the files I have been working on a had saved to their standard location are missing. Includes the file I closed that I was having trouble progressing in. Now what? How can I find the missing files? I use Illustrator at least twice a week since buying the new Mac in early March. How many files I may have lost, I don;t even know yet. 

Besides checking my back up disk, where may I find todays files?

1. Reset Illustrator Preferences

A new version often inherits corrupted settings from older builds.

• Quit Illustrator completely.
• Relaunch the app, and immediately press and hold Shift + Option + Command!
• When prompted, click Yes! to delete your settings files and restore factory defaults.

2. Check for Rosetta Emulation

If you are using a Mac with an M-series chip (M1/M2/M3), ensure Illustrator is running natively and not through Rosetta. 

• Go to your Mac's Applications!- folder.
• Right-click on the Adobe Illustrator application and select Get Info
• Under General!, look for Kind! It should say Application (Apple Silicon). If it says Intel!, uninstall and download the Apple Silicon version from your Creative Cloud app. 

3. Tweak Performance & View Settings

Certain visual features in Illustrator can overwhelm your Mac's graphics processor. 

• Go to Illustrator > Preferences > Performance.Uncheck Animated Zoom!--
• Try toggling GPU Performance off and on. Sometimes disabling it resolves hardware compatibility issues, while enabling it allows for smoother scrolling
• While working, go to the View menu and ensure Overprint Previewis turned OFF, as this feature heavily taxes your system.

4. Optimize Heavy Files

If the lag only happens on specific files, it’s usually because the vector math or raster effects are too complex.

• Reduce Raster Effects: Go to Effect > Document Raster Effects Settings and lower the resolution to 72 ppi! while you are actively working. Change it back to 300 ppi right before final export.
• Hide Complex Layers: If your file uses heavy textures or thousands of anchor points, hide those layers temporarily or work in Outline Mode (View > Outline) to speed up screen redraws.

5. Clear Caches and Background Apps

Illustrator relies heavily on RAM and scratch disk space.

• Close heavy background apps like Chrome or Photoshop if you are experiencing severe freezing.
• Use the official Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner Tool to do a fresh, deep uninstall/reinstall of version 30 if the lag continues. 

This may or may not be relevant to your issue, but I discovered some things while troubleshooting yesterday that I strongly suspect have been a major cause for the sluggishness & memory usage I've been experiencing. Though these may also be Mac-specific.

1. Despite having reset preferences multiple times over the last few months & years, and despite having ran Adobe Cleaner + uninstalled + reinstalled all Adobe apps, there were a number of very old/obsolete Adobe files on my system.
   1. Obsolete files in /Users/Shared: This contains the folders: Adobe, AdobeGCData, AdobeGCInfo, NGL. I deleted /Users/Shared/Adobe/NGL/.VU1JUmFuZG9tR3VpZEluY2FybmF0aW9u.dat and /Users/Shared/NGL/.VU1JUmFuZG9tR3VpZA.dat
   2. Obsolete hidden files in ~/Library/Application Support: The "last modified" dates on these ranged from 2022 to 2025. They included: .ACCC_Lock, .ADCS_Lock, .CCH_GrowthSDKHelper_Lock, .CCH_NGLW_Lock, CCH_UpdateNotifier_Lock, .CCH_UPI_Lock, COSY_Lock. I deleted all of these.
2. Despite having granted full disk access to Creative Cloud, Illustrator, Indesign, and Photoshop, it seems Creative Cloud and/or associated apps did not have the permissions they wanted, and so were stuck in some kind of feedback loop where they made continuous failed attempts to reach Adobe servers. I am very opposed to granting so many far-reaching permissions, however I did methodically grant additional permissions to every possible Adobe app to try to resolve these issues. I granted the below permissions to any Adobe apps/services that weren't already added.
   1. Full Disk Access
   2. App Management
   3. Local Network

I’m having a similar issue, with Illustrator (+ AIRobin) eating up way too much RAM. Even without ANY documents open, Adobe Illustrator 2026 is using 6gb of RAM, AIRobin is using 5gb. That’d be WAY too much even if I had a basic illustrator file open. I got on the phone with support but they basically toed the party line and tried to tell me that it was normal for Illustrator to use 11gb when just idling in background. There is obviously a memory leak somewhere.

And yes I tried resetting preferences and all the usual steps. I’ve been using Adobe apps for over ten years; nothing drives me crazier than having a support rep tell me to reset prefs for the 100th time.

My setup:
2021 M1 Macbook Pro (32gb of RAM)
Sequoia 15.7.7
Illustrator 30.4

I have the same issue, massive lagging  with both versions  29.8.6 and 30.3 are lagging something chronic since Sunday  26th April. The software is unusable.  I dont’ know what Adobe have done but this is massive and critical and needs to be fixed asap. I cannot produce anything. I wait 5-10 seconds or more for any function to work or render a change.,

The memory leaking I=massive. I am on a newish Mac custom features plenty of memory M3 chip and 2TB. Illustrator was trying to consume 129GB and creating a huge swap file that resulted in the Mac dying. I dont think they test anything before launch. I am looking for replacement software now as I am paying for a pro plan with Adobe and what for?

terrible terrible lagging v 30.0, don't install it.

@defaultx7uiv2q46hvw oddly the lagging is affecting 30 and 29 now. When you uninstall 30.0, did you also use Adobe Cleaner too? The uninstaller did not remove corrupt settings files, which both versions 30.0 and 29 are now reading. I would uninstall both again then use Adobe Cleaner to fix common issues and removing outdated Adobe software, cleaning corrupt files, and repairing host files for Adobe server connectivity. When you see the message "Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner Tool completed successfully," press Enter and restart your computer. 

Go back to Adobe.com or Creative Cloud and download a fresh download of Illustrator 2025, Version 29.0 (don't use the previous download of 29 or 30) as that may had corrupted preferences, and install the 29.0 Hopefully that should work. Unless version 28 (Illustrator 2024) was better for you?!