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logan_mcnay
Inspiring
February 23, 2024
Answered

Can't 'Save' or 'Save As' in After Effects

  • February 23, 2024
  • 5 replies
  • 1223 views

Hello, I can't 'Save' or 'Save As' in After Effects.

 

I've tried ctrl+s, ctrl+shift+s, and then nothing happens. In the Adobe After Effects Auto-Save, it isn't saving new versions of the file. When I save, it runs the function but doesn't actually do anything & won't create a new version of the file. The auto-saves are a day old now, since I haven't X'd out of the project, hence they're not updating there either.

 

I've tried purging all memory & disk cache & it didn't work. 

I don't want to X out of the project to uninstall AE & reinstall because I'll lose a day of work.

I've tried "save as copy" and it didn't do anything either.

 

Thanks,

Correct answer logan_mcnay

I believe I found the solution to my issue, I have a composition that when I duplicate it, I am no longer able to save the file; it must have a bug in it, so I screenshotted the layers I needed, reopened the file, created a new composition from scratch, and rebuilt that particular comp, & now it saves just fine. Hope that helps lead anyone else in the right direction who has this issue

5 replies

logan_mcnay
logan_mcnayAuthorCorrect answer
Inspiring
February 26, 2024

I believe I found the solution to my issue, I have a composition that when I duplicate it, I am no longer able to save the file; it must have a bug in it, so I screenshotted the layers I needed, reopened the file, created a new composition from scratch, and rebuilt that particular comp, & now it saves just fine. Hope that helps lead anyone else in the right direction who has this issue

Participant
June 10, 2025

Ran into a similar sounding issue earlier this week. Lost about 2 days of work because of it. It's a real sneaky one.
Just posting what was the solution for me:

I found myself unable to save my working file. This has happened to me for the third time in a week:
As I Cmd+S save the file, the little pop-up box that indicates the saving progress —the one with the little blue bar— pops up, but doesn’t fill up completely. It got stuck on a certain percentage (last time 41%, this time 71%), but rather than giving an error message or anything similar, it just seems to abort the saving process and closes the box. It looked as if I had saved it, but I actually hadn't.

I tried to remove all unused footage. Then all linked images/video/audio. This seems to bump the percentage of saving up from 71% to 75% strangely enough. Finally, when I deleted all layered Illustrator files (.ai), it managed to save again. These files were connected to an external server, but that connection was stable, and I could locate the files through right clicking > Reveal in Finder.
This happened using After Effects 2025, v25.1.0 (Build 68), running on a November 2024 MacBook Pro with Apple M4 Max, operating on OS Sequoia 15.4.1.

logan_mcnay
Inspiring
February 26, 2024

Hey Jenkmeister, 

 

I went & uninstalled AE, reinstalled, updated to version 24.2.1 (Build 2), & I've continued to have this issue not being able to save or save as. I keep losing days of work, would you have any suggestions? 

 

Also, other system specs are:

AMD Ryzen Threadripper 5975 32 core

256GB RAM

SSDS

2x NVIDIA 4090s

Drivers have been updated, windows has been updated

 

Thanks

Community Manager
February 23, 2024

Thanks. There was an issue a year or so ago with a missing Save option but if you're on 24.1, then that's not the issue. A couple of ideas are below but as AE is not giving you any error messages, I'm not confident there is a path out of this that saves your work.

 

Try going to the Creative Cloud Desktop app and see if you're still signed in. Just a thought that somehow AE thinks you're signed out. Don't sign out if you're not that, that could also cause AE to quit on you. 

 

You could also try a File -> Dependencies -> Collect Files... and see if AE can generate a new project for you.

 

If you do a Save As 23.* did that create anything for you? 

 

logan_mcnay
Inspiring
February 23, 2024

Hello, I'm on version 24.1.0 (Build 78)

 

 

Community Manager
February 23, 2024

What version of After Effects are you on?