After Effects crashes repeatedly after opening any project

[Ardak29179041fb3x]

I’m experiencing a recurring crash issue in After Effects that I have not been able to resolve, despite trying a wide range of solutions.

After I open a project, After Effects crashes consistently within 5–7 minutes, or sometimes immediately upon launching the project, sometimes when I tried to render. The crash messages vary with each occurrence, and I have attached screenshots of the errors for your reference.

This issue happens not only with an existing file, but also with completely new projects — After Effects crashes even when starting from scratch, showing different error messages each time.

It also affects multiple projects, regardless of their complexity.

• Updated After Effects to the latest version via Creative Cloud.

• Uninstalled and reinstalled both Creative Cloud and After Effects.

• Attempted to open and run the project in an older version from 2024 — issue still occurs.

• Simplified the main project by pre-rendering individual layers.

• Disabled all third-party plugins.

• Created a new project and imported the old one — crashes continued.

• The simplified version of the project with only pre-renders and no plugins still causes After Effects to crash.

• Cleared cache, reset preferences, and tried using different preview/rendering settings.
• Checked and updated GPU/CPU and etc drivers.
• These crashes occur even in a new projects with no third-party elements.

System:

• CPU: Intel Core i9-14900K

• RAM: 64 GB DDR5 6600 MHz

• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER

• OS: Windows 11 (fully updated)

• After Effects version: Latest (via Creative Cloud)

• Creative Cloud: Licensed

Please let me know what else I can do to resolve this issue! 

Screenshots of crash messages

[Kevin-Monahan]

Hello @Ardak29179041fb3x,

I appreciate the post. Welcome to the forum. I'm Kevin from Adobe Support, a moderator here. Thanks for the crash information and also about your system. Since you have a bug filed here, the team should be with you shortly to address this problem. Indeed, it seems unusual. I apologize for not having a quick answer to your problem. The team will need to investigate and will likely ask you for more information and a project file. If you could upload a sample project where the issue exists, that might be helpful. PM me the link and I will forward it to the team, if you don't mind. I hope the advice helps get your issue solved more quickly. Sorry for the hassle.

Thanks,
Kevin

[David.Arbor]

Hi @Ardak29179041fb3x, 

Sorry to hear you're experiencing so many crashes. Thank you for posting all this information, it's super helpful. You said you got rid of all third-party plug-ins, but in your errors, I see a couple references to PEDG2 and loopFlow. I'm not familiar with the first one, but I know loopFlow is a third-party tool.

Without crash logs, it's tough to say what's going on, but my first thought is that one or both of these effects are causing a problem. The fact you're crashing across multiple versions makes me think a plug-in that lives in your Media Core folder might be the cause. Can you post a screenshot of your Media Core folder from C:\ProgramFiles\Adobe\Common\Plug-ins\7.0\MediaCore?

I'm guessing you'll find the two plug-ins I mentioned there. A really easy test would be to temporarily move them to your desktop and see if you still crash. If you do, you can figure out which of the two is the problem by adding them back in one at a time. If you are able to ID the cause of the crash as one of these plug-ins then I'd check to see if there are any updates for either tool.

If removing these plug-ins doesn't help, then would you mind DMing me a crash log that I can share with the team?

1. Open the Help menu
2. Select "Enable Logging" and close AE when prompted
3. Relaunch AE and work until you get the crash.
4. Go to "C:\Users\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\After Effects\25.2\logs"
5. Send me the "After Effects Log.txt" file in the "logs" folder

If it's the correct log, the modified date should be immediately after you crashed.

Thanks,
- David, After Effects Engineering Team

[Ardak29179041fb3x]

Hi Kevin! Thank you for your reply!
I’m sharing a link to a test project (it’s very simple - it only contains footages and PNGs, with no third-party plug-ins used) that crashed when I tried to rename a folder. I’m also attaching the log file.

[URL removed by mod]

I hope this helps clarify the issue.

Thank you!

[Ardak29179041fb3x]

Hi!
Thanks so much for taking the time to look into this.

The screenshot I previously shared was taken before I reinstalled After Effects. At the moment, I have a clean installation of both Creative Cloud and After Effects, with no third-party plug-ins — but the program is still crashing.

As you suggested, I enabled logging and worked until the crash happened. I’m sending you a link to a very simple test project (it only includes some footage and PNGs — no third-party effects) that crashed when I tried renaming a folder. I’ve also attached the log file from that session.

[URL removed by mod]

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts!

[David.Arbor]

Hey @Ardak29179041fb3x,

Thanks for sending the project along (I deleted the Google Drive link from your post to protect your privacy). The logs you attached aren't actually crash logs, where did those come from? Can you go to the path I mentioned in my previous post and PM me the log named "After Effects Log.txt" You have to experience the crash first, though, or the log won't be helpful.

Thanks,
- David, After Effects Engineering Team