Lightroom (Desktop and Classic) performance crisis

[hao_atlarge]

There has been many posts concerning Lr performance issues. But I think there is a performance crisis.

What I'm experiencing:

Lightroom Classic is generally laggy, and almost unable to import, export or do other basic operations. The Map Module is especially unresponsive, i.e. very slow to load marks, to switch between photos, etc.

Lightroom Desktop is a little better, but import/export is often unresponsive.

Concerning Lr Desktop export, I found, when I set the cache size from 50GB to Maximum, the export becomes normal, but after changing this setting for a while (weeks), it doesn't work. This may be a clue to the problem.

My environment:

M1 Macbook Air 16+512, OS always updated, 50GB free disk space.

Lr Classic catalog: over 226000 photos, many collections and smart collections.

Catalog file and all previews on an external ssd with more than 100GB free space.

I contacted an 'agent' from Adobe and in the remote control session he looked around and he first talkd about RAM then disk space then Cloud... and finally told me:
"whenever any of the Adobe application is downloading or exporting or saving any image, it Takes place in your computer But if we change the settings and make sure that everything related to Adobe goes to cloud space."

I think the answer is ridiculous. I believe there are true experts here, so I start this new post.

Thanks in advance to those who would like to share there experience, insights, and solutions!

[hao_atlarge]

FYI:

Lightroom Classic version: 14.4 [ 202506051112-5918896a ]
License: Creative Cloud
Language setting: en
Operating system: Mac OS 15
Version: 15.5.0 [24F74]
Application architecture: arm64
Logical processor count: 8
Processor speed: NA
SqLite Version: 3.36.0
Power Source: Plugged In, 100%
Built-in memory: 16,384.0 MB
Dedicated GPU memory used by Lightroom: 214.9MB / 10,922.6MB (1%)
Real memory available to Lightroom: 16,384.0 MB
Real memory used by Lightroom: 1,620.8 MB (9.8%)
Virtual memory used by Lightroom: 421,348.3 MB
Memory cache size: 578.6MB
Internal Camera Raw version: 17.4 [ 2272 ]
Maximum thread count used by Camera Raw: 5
Camera Raw SIMD optimization: SSE2
Camera Raw virtual memory: 315MB / 8191MB (3%)
Camera Raw real memory: 321MB / 16384MB (1%)

Cache1:
NT- RAM:0.0MB, VRAM:0.0MB, Combined:0.0MB

Cache2:
m:578.6MB, n:0.0MB

U-main: 265.0MB

Standard Preview Size: 4608 pixels
Displays: 1) 2560x1600, 2) 4608x2592

Graphics Processor Info:
Metal: Apple M1
Init State: GPU for Export supported by default
User Preference: Auto
Enable HDR in Library: ON

Application folder: /Applications/Adobe Lightroom Classic
Library Path: /Volumes/H_T5_APFS/Lightroom Classic/PhotoArchive-v13-4.lrcat
Settings Folder: /Users/h.macintosh/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Lightroom

Installed Plugins:
1) Any Vision
2) FUJIFILM Tether App
3) jf Export Quality Tester
4) jf Metadata Presets
5) jf Metadata Viewer
6) Mylio Photos
7) Pixieset

Config.lua flags:

[Ian Lyons]

Your issue is not Lightroom Classic or Desktop. It's physics! You're using MacBook Air M1. This computer operates without fan assistance. Therefore, it's subject to thermal throttling on tasks such as import, export, preview building and batch operations that take much longer than a few minutes. 

Additionally, your System Info idicates that you also have a second display connected, and that you have the Library module previews configured for HDR. Both of these will cause a significant reduction in performance due to the limited memory and GPU resources of your MacBook Air M1.

[Ian Lyons]

I forgot to mention that the MacBooK Air by itself does not officially support HDR mode. Therefore, your external display would need to be HDR compatible otherwise enabling it for previews is a waste of your already limited resources.

[hao_atlarge]

Thank you for mentioning this. I will disable it and test.

[hao_atlarge]

Thanks for your analysis!
It's summer here in Shanghai, and the machine is indeed warm.
I thought about the physical limit, as I experienced bad performance of Lightroom mobile on iPhone 13 mini, and then I swiched to iPhone 15 pro last month, and Lr runs almost perfectly on the new phone.

Indeed, when I'm using the external 4K display, it seems the general performance is worse.
If the design of M1 Macbook Air limits the performance, do you think MacBook Pro with M1/M4 chip would greatly improve the performance?

Here's the data from iStat; I'm not sure if 74 degrees is too high.

[Conrad_C]

Whether it's Celsius or Farenheit, 74 degrees is not near the maximum CPU temperature of Apple Silicon, which is slightly above 100°C. For a MacBook Air, 74 degrees C might be an expected temperature at idle or somewhat busy on a warm day, and is far enough below the maximum that there was no problem with heat at the time that temperature reading was taken.

If the slowdown is due to thermal throttling, the signs would be that the CPU temperature was between 95 and 105 degrees C while Lightroom Classic is busy, such as editing masks in the Develop module or building bulk previews.

If you got those readings at idle, do your typical workload in Lightroom Classic/Lightroom and see how the specs change then, that would help us see what is going on.

If the design of M1 Macbook Air limits the performance, do you think MacBook Pro with M1/M4 chip would greatly improve the performance?

By @hao_atlarge

It depends, because the performance of different features in Lightroom Classic (and Lightroom) depends on different components.

If the slowdown is related to single-core M1 CPU performance, then an M4 will be faster than an M1.

If the slowdown is related to multi-core CPU performance (such as how fast bulk previews are generated), then a MacBook Pro could be faster if it has significantly more CPU cores than your M1 Air. The base M4 MacBook Pro only has 10 CPU cores, but the M4 Pro and Max have up to 14.

If the slowdown is related to high temperatures, then a new MacBook Air wouldn’t help very much because it still has no fan. A MacBook Pro with the base M4 would help somewhat, but it has only one fan. A MacBook Pro with the M4 Pro or Max would sustain maximum performance the longest and might never have to thermal throttle, because those variants have two cooling fans.

If the slowdown is related to GPU acceleration, AI, or external displays, then a Mac with a newer Apple Silicon processor (such as M3/M4) will have a more powerful GPU. A MacBook Pro can also have many more GPU cores than an Air, increasing GPU acceleration even more.

The 16GB of Unified Memory on your M1 Air is OK, but newer Airs can have up to 32GB, and MacBook Pros can have several times that. For current versions of Lightroom Classic/Lightroom, 24-36GB of Unified Memory is good. Adding more memory than that doesn’t make as much difference. One reason having more than 16GB is good is so that there is enough unused Unified Memory to allocate to the GPU, to allow full GPU acceleration.

[hao_atlarge]

Thanks for your analysis.

It's Celsius. I understand that high temperature would limit the performance, but the slowdown now is to the extent that basic operations like showing previews, loading geo marks in Map module, import several photos, export one photo are often stuck still. I think in my current environment, Lr should be expected to have a normal average performance.

[Ian Lyons]

The iStat Menus screenshot that you posted above shows that the primary SSD is 88% full, and that your memory pressure is 61%. Each of these on their own is an indication that your system is running out of resources. Can you share a screenshot of the Activity Monitor memory tab so that we can see how bad things actually are?

When capturing the screenshot make sure that LrC has been running for a while and is in the Develop module. Ideally, well into or at the end of an editing session rather than the beginning. I've attached a screenshot as an example of what needs to be included.

[hao_atlarge]

Sure: Lr Classic in Develop

[Conrad_C]

The Activity Monitor screen shot does confirm that Memory Pressure (as shown in the graph) is often higher than optimal (the yellow part of the graph). That confirms that more than 16GB would be good to have in your next Mac. When there is enough Unified Memory, the graph should be green most of the time, and it’s OK if it’s occasionally yellow.

However, this does not prove that memory is the sole cause of the slowdown. If it was strictly memory related, I don’t think serious slowdowns occur until Memory Pressure is high enough that the graph turns red. Another clue is the amount of Swap Used, which is 7GB. That's definitely more than if there was enough memory, but it isn’t excessively high. The SSD is not full, so low free space is not the cause either.

The slowdown is probably caused by not just one thing. It’s probably a combination of slower M1 CPU cores, fewer CPU cores than newer models, maybe a little less Unified Memory than optimal for the tasks being done, and maybe some degree of thermal throttling.

When watching performance reviews of new Macs, there were some Mac experts who said, for several years, that the M1 was still a great processor and used M1s were still good enough for most uses, even as the M2 and M3 were released. But in the last few months, the sentiment seems to have changed somewhat and now the M1 is seen as still good but not quite up to the demands of current graphics/video software, especially for the additional demands of newer features. AI features in particular need a GPU that is more powerful than what we had 5 years ago.

[hao_atlarge]

Thanks for your observation.

I think my current hardware is limiting the Lr performance. Despite that, I still expect to improve the performance from serious slowdown to a little bit slow through software level means before I decide to spend maybe 2000 usd:)

[Ian Lyons]

> Despite that, I still expect to improve the performance from serious slowdown to a little bit slow through software level means

If you absolutely don't need to have Lightroom Desktop and the Browser Helper open at the same time as using Lightroom Classic, then I suggest closing them. This should reduce the need to swap memory to SSD as frequently as a 7GB swap file and the memory pressure is indicating.

The slow downs when importing, building previews and other batch operations that take more than a few minutes are due to thermal throttling. 

[hao_atlarge · Accepted solution]

Thanks for all your suggestions!

Here I find an interesting solution:
https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/lightroom-classic-performance-issues/td...

It magically works!  All your suggestions I believe will further help with Lr performance, but I'd like to try this at the same time. It works; everything is normal for me. Now the problem is: what happens if I enable sync in the new catalog? I have over 200k smart previews in the cloud synced from Lr Classic. Will they be relinked to the original under the new catalog? Will there be duplicats? Will there be any loss?

[mononoke_7]

hello! I'm using the desktop lightroom version on M4 MacBook Pro with 24 RAM and 1TB hard drive and the poor performance of lightroom is very much noticeable on a newer device too. I also have a good network, download is Mbps 628.3, upload Mbps 26.67. it's lagging a lot, feels like if i was on windows 98 and dial-in internet from the 90s 😕 

[dj_paige]

hello! I'm using the desktop lightroom version on M4 MacBook Pro with 24 RAM and 1TB hard drive and the poor performance of lightroom is very much noticeable on a newer device too. I also have a good network, download is Mbps 628.3, upload Mbps 26.67. it's lagging a lot, feels like if i was on windows 98 and dial-in internet from the 90s 😕 

By @mononoke_7

It sounds like you are using Lightrooom and not Lightroom Classic, because upload and download speed really don't have much to do with Lightroom Classic performance (unless you are sync-ing with the cloud, which you haven't mentioned). Please post in the Lightroom (Ecosystem) forum

[dj_paige]

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