P: Photoshop can't open, freezes on splash image, uses all of ram trying to open then crashes.

[Bella5CE6]

I have googled every possible variation of this problem and tried every fix for this problem, none of them worked. I have tried reinstalling photoshop, deleting everything even remotely related to photohop in the appdata, deleting custom fonts, restarting the computer, updating graphics and computer, and holding every possible combination of alt, ctrl and shift while trying to launch in administrator mode. The result is always the same. It opens the splash image, gets to loading preferences or brushes, spikes RAM usage to every last byte of RAM I have, freezes the computer, then crashes.

And no i'm not running it on a potato i'm running it on an Alienware Aurora 4090, it should have more than enough power to handle this and Photoshop ran perfectly fine for months. Then just today it crashed and has never started up again.

Photoshop version 25.11

Help.

[William2388]

I removed both, beta and normal versions, with preferences deleted, and tried to install again, didn't help. but installing only oldest version (22.2) of photoshop, got some luck. Oldest version works for now, so at least I have photoshop.

[hellopaul4]

I'm having the same problem. I cannot open Photoshop - neither the release nor beta versions. There seems to be a memeory leak - upon launch, Photoshop just hangs on the splash screen, and gobbles up all my RAM (I have 128GB RAM and several TB of SSD space). I'm now launching PS Beta and looking at the Task Manger; it's going from 10GB...20GB....25GB (the splash screen just says "Done sorting font list.". Now at 40GB...50GB....I'll post this message before Chrome says it doesn't have enough memory to continue 'cos PS has gobbled it all up. (Ps is at 75GB now and rising quickly).

EDIT: I forced-quit Photoshop, and I'm now installing version 25.5 through the Creative Cloud Desktop app...

Upon launch of PS 25.5, it's doing exactly the same thing...currently at 50GB and rising. Ugh, Adobe, what have you done?! 60GB now....time for a force quit...now at 90GB...

I also tried 24.7.4....exactly the same problem. What's going on?!

[Motion Rotate]

Thankk youu bro problem solved. 

[Bogdan Bobo]

Photoshop and Illustrator is not opening - Adobe Community - 14781866

[Thorsten Schulz]

Same here after updating Photoshop Beta 25.12

Sincerely
Thorsten
Werbeagentur Schulz-Design 

[Thorsten Schulz]

Hello,
Thanks for your tip.
No BETAs appear in my Creatice Cloud Cleaner tool.

Sincerely
Thorsten

Werbeagentur Schulz-Design 

[Keeplookingup!]

Same issue here. Either Photoshop 2024 or the beta, both getting stuck at Halide Bottlenecks. When putting a 

~ in front of the according extension in the package, it just gets stuck at the next extension to load. 

This is SUPER FRUSTRATING since I need to complete a job and can't do anything. Cleaning all apps may be the workaround but that does not leave a professional impression to me regarding how Adobe handles this. 

[nina.slanina]

When i start opening the app (i tried with Indesign v19.5 and Photoshop v25.11), it starts to load, but then freezes and after some short time the whole screen turns black. Everything on the screen turns black. I had to force restart the computer, or it would just not open the app. I updated the drivers, and its still the same. The only app that didnt crash when i started it was photoshop v22.2. Did someone had something similar happening?

*note: i cant open the app at all.

I use windows 11, have the latest updates of apps and drivers.

[Bogdan Bobo]

In the Creative Cloud Cleaner tool, type e/Enter, y/Enter, 3/Enter, and then enter the number corresponding to the BETA application and press Enter.

[Ann Bens]

After de-installing After Effects beta 2025 I was able to open Ps again.

Windows 11

Did not install any other 2025 beta app.

[SA2024]

@Bogdan Bobo 
Many Thanks! I deleted all the BETA! It worked! Last time I use them! 
All the best
S

[Sameer K]

Hey, @Lior324097679aw9. Welcome to the Photoshop Community. I'll need more info to help you figure this out.

Has this started to happen since a recent update of Photoshop, or the Windows OS? Apart from reinstalling Photoshop, what other troubleshooting steps have you tried?

Ensure there are no stale preferences in your Photoshop. Go to the location of the preference folder below and rename it to backup.

• Windows 10/11: Users/[user name]/AppData/Roaming/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop [version]/Adobe Photoshop [version] Settings
• You can press Press the Windows key > Enter 'Run' > Enter %APPDATA%\Adobe
• Rename the Adobe Photoshop folder by adding a .old at the end. (Adobe Photoshop 2024 > Rename > Adobe Photoshop 2024. old), you can later restore these preferences if needed.(https://adobe.ly/4860qM9)
• Restart the computer.

These changes will give a fresh start to Photoshop as a fresh install.

We're investigating a similar series of reports posted here for Photoshop & this might be related: https://adobe.ly/3WRw8cI

Let me know how it goes.

Thanks!

Sameer K

(Use '@mention' to tag me when you reply)

[Glenchan]

When i open Platform PS n PS beta, it's holding in "reading preferences", no answer.
uninstall PS and PS beta, also holding in "reading preferences"

how can i fix? Thanks

Window 10

[user39018312rquj]

- Photoshop 24.7.4

- Windows 10 19045.4651

[user39018312rquj]

Oops. Missed the solution.

After remving After Effects Beta I was able to open Photoshop.

[Lior324097679aw9]

It started this morning. as far as I know There wasn't a windows update today. No metter how many times I uninstalled photoshop and reinstalled it - it still gets stuck while "reading preferences".... and then crushes. I have some screen pics of the windows crush reports and of massages that apear th minute the photoshop crushes. I even manualy deleted every "photoshop 2024" line from the registry and reinstalled photoshop from creative cloud again - still the same. photoshop refuse to open and crushes. I attached pictures of windows crush reports and photoshop massages. 

[SA2024]

hi

desinstall ALL the Beta version of ALL your softwares. It will work again afterwards.
Best
S

[patrickx007]

I'm having the same problem too.
Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign refuse to open on my iMac Retina 5K, 27-inch, 2017 with 64 GB of RAM.
My OS version is: MacOS Ventura Version 13.6.8

[Glenchan]

Same Here, Thanks Bro

[hellopaul4]

@patrickx007  Hmmm.....I just (as a test) loaded up InDesign, and it, too, is failing to load while it chews through all my 128GB of RAM. It's now (still) on the splash screen ("Loading shortcuts" of which I have almost none set) and it's at 56GB.......make that 60GB.....64GB...time to force quit it. I'm on Windows 10. I don't recall updating InDesign recently, and it was running fine a couple of days ago. I guess there's some other component in the Adobe CC world that has completely screwed things.

[Bella5CE6]

Removing the beta installations of media encoder and character actually worked. Thanks

[Vincent343133211n8m]

Bonjour à tous

Depuis ce matin, lorsque je lance Photoshop, celui-ci se bloque au démarrage puis plante. Impossible de l'ouvrir. Même chose avec Photoshop Beta.
En regardant ce qui se passait avec le gestionnaire des tâches, il apparaît qu'au démarrage, Ps sature rapidement la mémoire vive de mon PC, puis bloque. Pourtant, j'ai 32Go de RAM sur un processeur Intel core 9.

J'ai réinstallé d'anciennes versions jusqu'à Ps 2023, et je rencontre toujours le même problème.

Pourtant, il y a 15 jours, tout marchait très bien, et entre temps je suis partis en vacances donc ordinateur éteint tout du long.
Qui aurait une solution pour m'aider, svp ? Là je craque ! 😞

Merci d'avance !

[patrickx007]

Yes, I also think it's related to Creative Cloud. Yesterday, I used these applications without any issues all day long, but since this morning, it's been impossible to open them. Premiere Pro, After Effects, Audition, and Media Encoder are working fine, though. It's really strange

[Santiago22378374f23m]

Estimada comunidad,

Tengo un problema con Photoshop. Hoy lo actualicé, tanto su versión normal como el beta, y al momento de iniciar cualquiera de los dos, se queda en la pantalla de carga. Ninguno pasa de allí. Pero lo más grave, es que a medida que pasa el tiempo, el programa empieza a consumir mucha memoria RAM. Va creciendo de 2 mil MB (2 GB) a 10 mil MB (10 GB), luego a 20 mil MB (20 GB), y no para de subir, hasta que le doy "finalizar tarea" en el Task Manager. 

Ya intenté descargar la versión que antecede a cada uno de los programas, pero sigue ocurriendo el mismo problema. Yo ayer los estaba usando con toda naturalidad, y hoy después de la actualización fue que empezó a generar ese problema. Y tampoco alteré ninguna preferencia o instalé alguna otra cosa, como para que afectara el consumo de RAM a niveles tan altos.

¿Qué puedo hacer? ¿qué puede estar fallando?

[kglad]

in the future, to find the best place to post your message, use the list here, https://community.adobe.com/

p.s. i don't think the adobe website, and forums in particular, are easy to navigate, so don't spend a lot of time searching that forum list. do your best and we'll move the post (like this one has already been moved) if it helps you get responses.

<"moved from cc desktop bugs">