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Participant
February 20, 2024
Answered

Premiere - Not letting me delete video

  • February 20, 2024
  • 1 reply
  • 1385 views

This is really frusturating because I have looked everywhere for a solution and nothing. Here is the problem I am having:

So I've completed editing the episode, everything has been exported and I've closed Premiere, shut down and reused my computer for around two weeks, and so on. In fact, I wasn't even on Premiere since that time. However, for no reason at all, I cannot delete the file even though it isn't open. I have Windows 11(or 10, I honestly don't know I'm not a computer person), and I keep getting the error message "This action can't be completed because the file is open in Adobe Premiere Pro 2023." Premiere isn't even running. And for some reason, all of the other videos that were in the same project have all been deleted.. except this one? I've checked task manager and Premiere isn't running. I can't delete, get rid of, or even move the file from the folder it is in. I even went inside the project, deleted the entire timeline, videos attached, and then the project itself. Nothing. The video is somehow still running in Premiere.. even if the entire project is gone and Premiere isn't running. Does anyone know why this is happening? Or why it only affects some videos imported into Premiere, but not others that are very very similar?

Correct answer Averdahl

Yes, I can delete any other file, 
My Windows account type is administrator.


The file may be locked and needs to be unlocked as Premiere Pro hinted about in it´s error message. I used this program some years ago to unlock a file: LockHunter is a free 64/32 bit tool to delete files blocked by any processes

 

Unlock it and then delete it. Hopefully that works.

 

quote

Yes, I can delete any other file, 
My Windows account type is administrator.


By @IReallyPlay

 

1 reply

Participating Frequently
May 23, 2025

I'm having the same issue but the file I'm trying to delete is 30GB and it pisses me off. 

I'm here to ask if you were able to delete the file you want? 

Averdahl
Community Expert
Community Expert
May 24, 2025

If you get a similar error such as "This action can't be completed because the file is open in Adobe Premiere Pro 2023" i would try to import the file in a Premiere Pro project. When done, right click on the clip and choose Make Offline and in the dialog that pops up make sure to select Media files Are Deleted. Click OK and then click OK in the new dialog that pops up.

 

This will delete the file from your computer and hopefully it will work since this time it is Premiere Pro that deletes the file from your computer. This should hopefully override the error message you got earlier.

 

Test it and report back! 🙂

 

 

quote

I'm having the same issue but the file I'm trying to delete is 30GB and it pisses me off. 

I'm here to ask if you were able to delete the file you want? 


By @IReallyPlay

 

Averdahl
Community Expert
AverdahlCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
May 24, 2025

Yes, I can delete any other file, 
My Windows account type is administrator.


The file may be locked and needs to be unlocked as Premiere Pro hinted about in it´s error message. I used this program some years ago to unlock a file: LockHunter is a free 64/32 bit tool to delete files blocked by any processes

 

Unlock it and then delete it. Hopefully that works.

 

quote

Yes, I can delete any other file, 
My Windows account type is administrator.


By @IReallyPlay