The Remove tool can consume a lot of credits in a single operation

[Carlos_Oliveras]

(I've edited this post - originally I thought this was happening just with remove people, but now I noticed that this happens even with the Remove tool as is, no need to use "Find distractions", so I'm rewriting my original post.)

In PS 2025, if the Remove tool is set to "Generative AI on" and then I paint several times creating a discontiguous selection, it will consume as many credits as separated selections there are (still, I'm not 100% sure it's a 1:1 equivalence, but it is approximate).

The same operation done manually (with a selection and generative fill) consumes a single credit (1 credit).

Is this designed to work like that, or is it a bug? Shouldn't it, at the very least, display a warning with some kind of quotation?

I'm using Win 11, PS 26.0.0.

[deutsche_3824]

Ah, classic Adobe move. 😅 They’ll charge you an arm and a leg for convenience.

It's not a bug, but it's kind of a side effect of the "Remove distractions > People" tool with Generative AI on. When you use that one-click remove option, it's scanning and processing the whole image, which eats up way more resources (hence the extra credits). It’s basically Adobe's way of charging you for the ease of not doing each person manually.

Your workaround of downscaling and cropping makes sense in theory, but Adobe’s tools are probably still “seeing” the whole image context and trying to process it as if it’s high-res, so you end up burning even more credits for fewer results. :facepalm:

Tbh, if you're dealing with a lot of these, it might be better to stick with manual selections and generative fill. Not ideal, but at least you won’t feel like you’re hemorrhaging credits.

[Carlos_Oliveras]

Hi Deutsche: That was my first thought (that they are charging for the detection), but the people detection runs locally. Only the generation itself runs on Adobe servers, and resource-wise it appears to require the same processing power as if I had manually selected people, which costs 1 credit. In fact, with 1 credit I get 3 variations, whereas with remove people I get just the one (and 6x cost??). It strikes me as odd .

And even so, if the cost can be up to 6x, it should provide some kind of quotation before running, and more so when even lo-res images can cost you even more, which makes the cost unpredictable.

I've looked this up in Adobe help pages, but I found nothing specific. They do say these things will change over time, credit cost is related to processing power, etc. So, yes, maybe you're right and it does work like this - but still, I find this an oddity. 🧐

[Fer37740812cp3o]

1. "I experience the same issue. As a professional photographer, I use this feature for retouching faces and removing imperfections. Typically, I work in small strokes, but I’ve noticed that it deducts 10 to 12 credits each time. Thanks, Carlos, for pointing that out."

[Tripiyon]

Hello everyone, the same thing is happening to me. I hope this is a bug and will be fixed as soon as possible. It is a way to avoid using the Remove Tool as the expense of credits is prohibitive.

[Kenji38870694l4ek]

I think "Generative AI off" mode won't cost any credits. Did you try it yet?

[Carlos_Oliveras]

Hi, if you read the original post, it specifies that:

(...) In PS 2025, if the Remove tool is set to "Generative AI on" (...)

So, sure - if the Remove tool is set to "Generative AI off", then it won't happen 😅  That's just the problem, what happens when it is set to on.

Is it a bug? Is it intended behavior? That's for Adobe to answer. Not much luck so far, though. 🤔

Have a great day.