Very high CPU usage in Photoshop 26.8

[vintezisCS]

Yesterday i've updated to the recent version.

As you can see, both version run, but no any file loaded, so both are in "idle" state:

Photoshop 26.8 - high CPU usage

any idea?

[Srishti Bali]

Hi @vintezisCS

We're sorry to hear you're experiencing high CPU usage while working in Photoshop.

To help improve performance, please try optimizing Photoshop by following the steps in this article: https://adobe.ly/44tk05x

Additionally, you can try resetting Photoshop preferences using the steps here: https://adobe.ly/2Qzc0K3
Note: Make sure to back up your settings before resetting. Here's how: https://adobe.ly/2vNz6FG

Let us know if this helps or if the issue persists—we're here to assist you!

Regards,

Srishti

[D Fosse]

A lot of users with similar problems (high resource usage with Photoshop idle) has reported back that a full and complete reset of preferences fixed it.

The cases I've seeen have all been on systems with an integrated GPU, both Mac and Windows alike. But that's the thing they've had in common. An integrated GPU uses shared system memory. So it's not far fetched to suspect the GPU is taking all these resources.

Keep in mind that the preferences/settings contain a lot more than your own user settings. It's the entire application configuration, including lots of hidden and system-dependent parameters. 

Corrupt preferences tend to look like application bugs and are frequently mistaken for that.

[vintezisCS]

Sorry guys (Shrishti, D Fosse), but the complete setting/preferences reset was meaningless. Of course, after the reset PS was in the 1-3% range, but!

After I rearranged the panels – as use to be – on my TWO(!) monitor setting, the high cpu issue is back.

So, again the usual thing from Adobe: new version, old problems come back. So, frustrating.

[Anshul_Saini]

Hi @vintezisCS, thank you for the update. You mentioned that the high CPU usage resurfaces after rearranging panels across your two-monitor setup. That’s an important clue. To help us dig deeper and try to reproduce this on our end, could you help with a few details?
 • What are the resolutions and refresh rates of both monitors? Are they using different color profiles or scaling settings?
 • Are you docking panels outside the main Photoshop window (i.e., floating panels on the second monitor)? If so, could you describe your typical workspace layout? A screenshot (with no sensitive content) would be helpful.
 • When CPU spikes, does the Energy Impact or Memory Pressure also increase noticeably?
 • Copy & paste system info from the PS help.

 • Are there any plugins installed?

Also, just let me clarify on what “100,4%” CPU usage actually means:
 • On macOS, CPU usage can exceed 100% because it’s calculated per thread.
 • If you have a system with multiple cores (e.g., a quad-core CPU with 8 threads), the maximum total usage can be up to 800%.
 • So 100,4% means that Photoshop is continuously using just over one full CPU core.

We truly appreciate your patience and detailed testing. It helps us surface edge-case behaviors that are otherwise hard to catch. Once we have more of these insights, we’ll be able to loop in engineering if needed or test with a similar configuration.

Looking forward to your reply!

Best regards,

Anshul Saini

[vintezisCS]

Of course, tommorrow mornig I will come with screenshots, but for now some details:

iMac M1 (macos 14.7.6) - 8 core (4 performance and 4 efficiency)

display res: 2560x1440 (60Hz - as i know)

External display: DELL E2418HN, res: 1920x1080 (60 Hz)

Display arrange: left to right (iMac-Dell), aligned to top

almost every panel "sticked" to each other on the second (dell) monitor, on the iMac just the canvas and toolbar

In PS 25.12 i use the same workspace.

I now what the CPU usage means, but can we agree in that, in idle mode more than 100% is huge? 🙂

[vintezisCS]

I tried again: resetting PS 26.8 > restart => everything is fine, CPU usage is 1-2% in idle.

Copied the workspace file (.psw) into settings > launch PS => everything is fine, same as before

BUT after I activated the workspace (two monitor setup) the CPU jumped to 200% and the Energy impact goes from 0,9 to 3,900.

Interestingly after I set workspace back to default (Essential, i guess) the same values (CPU, Energy) are still there, but if I opened PS again (with the last active default Workspace) everything is worked fine.

Attached screenshots: with ending of -ibix and -ibtg these are the moment of activate the two monitor workspace, and -idxk is when restarted with default workspace.

The Vintezis-psw.xml is really a psw (renamed to xml because this forum doesnt allowed to upload psw file), this is my actually used Workspace setting in PS25.12.

I hope these helps to find and fix this bug.

[D Fosse]

Not convinced it's a bug. Seems much more likely to be corruption somewhere in the settings (see my post above for why and how that can happen)..

I'd go into the user account and wipe it. Move the whole Photoshop settings folder to the desktop, so that a new one can be built when you relaunch Photoshop. This returns the application to clean, out-of-the-box factory state.

[vintezisCS]

Fortunatelly you don't have to be convinced. If something "small" like the workspace is working in the previous version but not in the current version, than it's a bug.

And – as i wrote – i did wipe all the settings, and I copied only the workspace.psw into the new settings folder. So please, read before write.

[vintezisCS]

Were you able to reproduce the bug? Or did you see my answer?

[D Fosse]

@vintezisCS If it's me you're asking, then no, I cannot reproduce this on either of my two desktop machines.

You say you "copied" the workspace - what happens if you don't do that, and just make and save a new workspace?

[Trevor.Dennis]

You say you "copied" the workspace - what happens if you don't do that, and just make and save a new workspace?

By @D Fosse

I wonder if those workspaces were saved with Shortcuts, Toolbars, and Menus?  There'd be capacity there to transfer a problem.  BTW  I'm surprised you are still helping this OP

[Anshul_Saini · Accepted solution]

Hi @vintezisCS,

Thanks again for all the detailed information and for your continued follow-ups. I ran some tests on my end using the setup you described, but unfortunately, I wasn’t able to reproduce the high CPU usage, even when leaving Photoshop idle with panels active or a file open.

That said, I want to suggest a few more things that might help isolate the behavior further:

• Is the Creative Cloud Desktop app running in the background? If so, could you try quitting it and see if that affects the CPU usage?

• Could you try closing panels one by one, especially the Libraries panel, and check if the usage drops after disabling any particular one?

• As D Fosse mentioned, even if your settings folder is wiped, it’s possible that something problematic is coming along with the old .psw.

• Just for testing, could you try creating a new user account on your Mac, launch Photoshop 26.8 there without importing any workspace or settings, and recreate your dual-monitor layout manually? If the issue doesn’t occur in that clean user environment, it would indicate some form of profile corruption or inherited config inconsistency.

You’re clearly putting in a lot of effort here and helping surface edge-case issues, which is hugely valuable. I’m continuing to follow along, and happy to pass along anything new that might emerge. Appreciate your patience with this.

Best,

Anshul Saini

[vintezisCS]

Hi @Anshul_Saini !

Thanks for the answer, and it seems – as you guessed – the library panel is the guilty one. Everything is fine while the library panel is closed, but that moment i opened, the CPU load jumps to above 100%, no matter where the panel is (main or external display).

What realy wierd is not every library causes problem but with colors... if there are only images, shapes, etc nothing is happening (the CPU load jumps to high a little bit, and returns to 1-2%).

In Photoshop 25.12.0 the same libraries are working flawlessly.

[fzmuhammad]

Facing the same issue. 

[vintezisCS]

@fzmuhammad It seems the library panel causes the problem, try to close that one, or just navigate back to the root of libraries on the panel.

At my side this "fixed" the cpu issue, but of course this is a bug i think.