when encoding files, Premiere pro doesn't use 100% of my cpu

[nams25lerler]

Why when encoding files, Premiere pro doesn't use 100% of my cpu.. i've tried many ways in other community posts, but the results don't work in my case. has anyone experienced this too? and does anyone already have a solution regarding this problem?

my pc specs are listed in the screenshoot
Thank you

[nams25lerler]

BTW, previously it used to use up to 100% cpu but only lasted up to 40% then it slowed down to 50% CPU and eventually made it render much slower.

[R Neil Haugen]

The percentage use of the computer varies due to tons of factors.

The media on the sequence, the effects used, the export settings, the GPU and driver, the other bits on the motherboard, throughput for the various (and numerous) files in use for the export process, and of course, the amount of free space on the disc you are exporting to.

Premiere needs at least 4-5 times the final expected file size in free space on the drive you export to, to do it's work efficiently.

Next, factors like whether there is long-GOP media either on the sequence, or you are exporting to long-GOP codec, then even whether it's one or two-pass encoding and the capabilities of your GPU become an issue.

Some others 'here' like @RjL190365 can get data from you about your specific setup, and give a very detailed answer as to what to expect and why.

[mattchristensen · Accepted solution]

@nams25lerler the short answer is that it's not always possible to use the full 100% of the CPU in all situations. Exporting requires all the hardware in your system to work together (CPU, Memory, Disks, GPU, possibly Network), and it may be that the speed of one of the other components is limiting how much the CPU can be utilitzed. That does not mean there's a problem! You could, for example, disable your GPU and maybe get 100% CPU usage, but you'd be left with a much slower export. Full CPU usage isn't always the best thing, if your goal is fastest export times.

The long answer is that the big factor is also which types of footage you are using, what your sequence is like (frame size, effects, titles, graphics, etc), and what format you are exporting to. All of these factors affect how Pr will make use of your hardware. These are the things you can control:

1. Preferences > Media > Enable Hardware Accelerated Decoding: make sure this is turned on (and you restart if you turned it on)
2. File > Project Settings > General > Renderer: make sure this is set to use the CUDA accelerated renderer
3. In your export settings, if exporting to H.264 or H.265, make sure the Output video report says "Hardware Encoding". If it says "Software Encoding" that means something in your export settings is making the export not able to use the encoding hardware on your system. Try using one of the built-in presets and modifying from there, watching that nothing you change sets it off of "Hardware Encoding".
4. Make sure you have a recent/updated NVIDIA Studio Driver installed.

If all that is in order, then if you see CPU usage like your screenshot, it's just because Premiere Pro is doing its best to get you the fastest export, for example sharing the encoding tasks with the GPU. That can mean a faster export, even if the CPU isn't at 100%. Also, your CPU has 6 physical cores, each of which can "pretend" to be two cores for a total of 12, which is why you see 12 graphs in Task Manager. In your screenshot you have the 12 virtual cores all running at 3.9 GHz – in my opinion that's a great use of your CPU. 

I hope that helps!