Rendering in After Effects is taking ages!

[JyotDiliip]

Rendering Issue in After Effects (2024 & 2025) – Extremely Slow Performance

I have been using After Effects 2024 for a long time, and rendering a 1-minute video used to be much faster. Recently, I updated to After Effects 2025 (v25), and ever since then, rendering has become extremely slow—taking around an hour for a 1-minute video.

Steps Taken:

• I rolled back to After Effects 2024 (v24), but the issue persists.
• The project is not complex—it contains only basic color corrections and looks adjustments, with no 3D effects or heavy transitions.

System Specifications:

• Model: Predator Helios 300
• Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-9750H CPU @ 2.60GHz
• RAM: 16GB
• System Type: 64-bit
• Graphics Card: Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060

Issue Summary:

• Before updating to After Effects 2025, rendering was much faster.
• After updating, the rendering time increased drastically.
• Rolling back to v24 did not solve the problem.
• My project is lightweight, so it shouldn't take this long.
  
  

Would appreciate any help in troubleshooting this issue!

[nishu_kush]

Thanks for reaching out, Dilip.

Have you tested with a different project and media? Do you get the same results? Are there any third-party plug-ins installed? Do you get the same results when exporting using After Effects render queue?

Let us know, we're here to help.

Thanks,
Nishu

[EyeCreate2024]

I am having the same issue. What would take a few seconds is now taking 30+ minutes for a 15 second video. Nothing has changed other than updates on AfterEffects and Media Encoder recently. My process has remained the same (clearing cache, etc.). I'm running on a W11 PC.

[EyeCreate2024]

I thought I'd make an update to my post. I installed previous versions of both After Effects and Media Encoder with the same issue still present. As of right now, it has taken an hour and a half so far, with another hour and half to go according to media encoder FOR 15 SECONDS OF VIDEO. I have a video that I will be working on for a client tomorrow that will be anywhere from 40 minutes to an hour. I'm scared to find out how long that one is going to take to render. This is unacceptable.

[nishu_kush]

I understand the inconvenience. What are the details of the media (frame rate, frame size, format/codec) and which effects are used? If possible, could you share your project file with the media so that I can test it on my end? Feel free to share via DM if you do not want to share it publicly.

Looking forward to your response.

Thanks,
Nishu

[KellyMB]

Hi Nishu, I'm having the same exact issue. This is outrageous! And I've watched every YouTube video possible trying to improve the performance. I even reformatted my computer and placed everything on an SSD except for the actual file. All of this started with the 2025 update and it has been a terrible experience to wait over 45 minutes for a 1.5 second segment of my timeline to render.

I am MORE than happy to email you my file to let you test it on your machine. I truly am at my wit's end a this point. Please let me know if this is something you might be able to help with. 

These are my machine specs:

MacBook Pro 2019

2.3 GHz 8-Core Intel Core i9

Radeon Pro Vega 16 4 GB

Intel UHD Graphics 630 1536 MB

32 GB 2400 MHz DDR4

MacOS 15.5 (24F74)

[JHillPhD]

If you pre-render your comp before exporting it will be a lot faster. If you have an external SSD used for your cache and previews with enough allocated space, that can also speed up your render times. Also make sure that you have the hardware acceleration ticked on and enable preview from disk cache settings ticked on as well.

[KellyMB]

And @JHillPhD Already on top of that. I've tried all of that. I PROMISE you. I spent all day yesterday watching different YouTube videos and trying every method people have suggested. I have a Samsung T9 2TB SSD and it's pretty empty other than the Adobe caches and other files that it collects. I've tried it both ways...caches on the SSD and caches on the internal hard drive in the folder next to the project file.  Same exact issue. 

[nishu_kush]

Sorry to hear about the issue, Kelly.

What's the exact version of After Effects you're using? Do you mind installing the After Effects 24.x version and trying to export the same project file? To open the file from the 2025 version in 24.x, open the project in 2025 and go to File > Save As > Save a Copy as 24.x.

Let me know how it goes in the older version.

Thanks,
Nishu

[ToolfarmJP]

Have you used the lastest version of the graphic card driver?

[Warren Heaton]

@JyotDiliip 

While working in After Effects, what render time are you seeing for each Layer in the Composition Profiler? 

[Yael32827509zzpz]

im currently dealing with this too, i thought itd be fixed with the latest update but no