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Exciting_force5CAD
Participant
Jul 21, 2025 2:54 PM UTC
Question

Slow and noisy 480p rendering on MacBook M4 Max with Premier Pro

Hello...

 

I have big problem with Premier Pro in my 3 days new MacBook M4 Max - 36GB RAM, 2TB SSD, 14-CPU, 32-GPU and 16-NE. 

 

I'm professional video editor, so I bought this machine for my everyday workflow. When I tested my MacBook today in Premier Pro for the first time I was really shocked... 3 days ago I created video only with footage from camera for review, on my computer at home with Windows. Today I want to render it, only for a review in 480p on hardware encoding in Premier Pro and the render really takes like 3-4 hours to render. It is like only 1 hour and 10 minutes long video only with footage and few texts. Yes... and I'm not even talking about the noisy fans. It is like Airbus on airport really... Why? It is only very easy render in 480p, not 8K footage. The MacBook also gets very very hot.

 

Before I bought this Mac, I read lot of several reviews about how it was the best machine for work, for video editors and like it was very quiet and now, I see the opposite... In Premier Pro Mac is really smoothly, but the rendering is not normal I think.

I normally edit in Premier Pro on my PC too. At home I created a project with 4K footage from DJI Osmo cam. Then I had go away, so I shared the Premier project to google drive on, then I downloaded on Mac with the footage. I opened it and make a few more texts layer to project, I waited for the cache audio files to download and export it for review. I only exported in 480p to make it fast and It took like 3-4 hours..

 

Thank you for your helps and tips.

10 replies

Ishan Y
Ishan Y
Inspiring
Jul 21, 2025 4:20 PM UTC

Hi,

I'm sorry to hear about your poor experience. Could you share some details on the source files (format, codec, frame rate)? You mentioned in your post that you're working with 4K source files. Is your Sequence resolution also in 4K? Please also mention any effects you've used in your project and share your current Premiere Pro version.

 

Thanks,

Ishan

Please tag me (@) in your replies so that it notifies me and helps me respond promptly.
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Exciting_force5CADAuthor
Participant
Jul 21, 2025 4:50 PM UTC

480p
HW encoding
H 264

Render at maximum depth

Use maximum render quality


My sequence is in 4K, and i don't use any effects, only text layer. I tested like 4 versions of Premier, but it is the same

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Ishan Y
Ishan Y
Inspiring
Jul 21, 2025 6:09 PM UTC

Adding to Averdahl's recommendations, please reduce your sequence resolution if you don't plan on exporting your project in 4K.

Also, have you tried exporting the same project on your Windows system? If so, is there a big difference in the export time? 

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Averdahl
Community Expert
AverdahlCommunity Expert
Community Expert
Jul 21, 2025 3:08 PM UTC

What are you exact export settings?

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Exciting_force5CADAuthor
Participant
Jul 21, 2025 3:47 PM UTC

480p
HW encoding
H 264

Render at maximum depth

Use maximum render quality

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Averdahl
Community Expert
AverdahlCommunity Expert
Community Expert
Jul 21, 2025 5:51 PM UTC

For only a review version, skip Render at maximum depth and Use maximum render quality since both can add loooong time to renders.

 

Any effects used? All drone footage as source footage and if yes, what resolution?

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