A long time to save a file in Photoshop

Forum|Forum|8 months ago
July 8, 2025
2 replies
138 views

Mac Studio M1, 32 GB RAM, PS 26.8.1 - a file with 10-12 layers, LZW, 25-35MB on drive, Wacom connected.

It takes 15-25 seconds to save a TIF file. If I have to save 3-5 files it takes even more for a file.

Photoshop renders PNG relatively quick, the only problem is with saving source files.

...and why an idle Photoshop uses 48GB of memory (Purge option is not available!)...?

macOS

ffuuAuthor

Participant

I'm sorry Davescm, nonsense, but anyway, thanks for the try.

Saving without compression doesn't change the saving time! The older Photoshop (the Intel translation) saves the TIFFs significantly faster (I save it on the system drive), and with LZW compression the 8 performance cores should do that in 'no time'. Exporting 44MPx PNG on transparency takes less time than saving the source file. This is modern Silicon Mac Studio with a quick storage and NOT 10yo Mac Mini...

To my secondary question - I allocate ony 20GB (69%), restart helps, but after 2 hours of intensive work Photoshop with no open files reports 40-50GB memory usage.

davescm

Community Expert

Saving without compression, is far from nonsense, and definitely saves time. I regular save large files (10GB plus) and the difference is seconds vs minutes. That is why many of us working with large files turn off compression and take the file space hit. In your case though the issue you are experiencing appears to be different. I don't know who marked the answer as correct, but I've unmarked it.

I use PCs not Macs but I cannot explain how you are seeing '40-50GB memory usage' on a system that only has 32GB installed. It sounds like the report you are using is including memory swapped with disk. I'll step out and let a Mac user try and help.

Dave

davescm

Community Expert

Try turning off file compression. The result will be larger files but saving and opening times will be much faster.

I cannot comment on your use of 48GB memory as your post states you only have 32GB of memory installed? Photoshop will normally use the memory allocated in preferences. It does not give the memory back to the OS when closing down a file, ass that would slow down batch processing considerably.

Dave

Sign up

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Sign in to Adobe Community

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Scanning file for viruses.

This file cannot be downloaded