Slow rendering on new M1 iMac

[Cynthia5C8D]

Rendering has been extremely slow on my new M1 iMac despite having additional ram (16gb).

Am I doing something wrong with the settings? Everything is set in the same way I've been using on my old MacBook Air, all apps & software are up to date.

Usually my MacBook Air can render a 1 hr long 1080p video in around 45 mins - 1 hr.
However, on my iMac I'm rendering a 1 hr 720p video with the same type of graphics and it has been 5-6 hours since I've started.

 

MacBook Air: (1080p)

M1 iMac: (720p)

[Ann Bens]

Export to a local drive instead of an external one.

[Cynthia5C8D]

Ok I will try that next time. The only thing is that I've been exporting to my external drive for all my videos when using my MacBook Air 2017 and didn't have an issue with rendering times so I'm not sure why the iMac is. If the external drive is the issue then I'm thinking it could be the USB adaptor since the iMac only has USB-C ports.