This is RIDICULOUS! Fix this lag issue!

Same here. We spend now approx 4 hours per week for waste waiting for illustrator to become responsive again. We use i7 surface studios here. This problem has been ongoing for, like, 3 weeks now, and if it does not get resolved, we'll start looking for alternative software providers, because this just isn't acceptable.

So bitterly disappointed with Illustrator. It's painfully slow and crashes a few times a day. I have a new iMac Pro which is pretty souped-up and Illustrator is just as slow on this machine as it is on my old laptop. I've had about 4 remote support sessions with Adobe support and couldn't find a solution, in fact, they actually did something which stopped InDesign from opening and I had to create a new user on my computer and move everything across which was a pain in the butt plus had to reinstall all my brush, swatches, tablet driver etc about 4 times. I think I spent over 9 hours on remote support. Does anyone know a good Illustrator alternative?

What's with your gentle reminders. Make a product that isn't laggy.

I connected with support, they told me to do the GPU adjustment and disable graphics card auto-switching but the problem persisted. Then they told me to create a new User session in my mac and in that new session the laggy performance was gone. Then they told me it was becase of a "software corruption" in my current session. However I run other programs and they're not sluggish.

Another interesting thing was when I connect my external monitor and drag the illustrator window from one screen to another, a blink occurs in the Ai window. (like some sort of switch between retina/no-retina?)

I don't wanna give up my User session, I think Illustrator is the one to blame, not my "corrupted software" by the way I haven't installed any pirate program and the computer is brand new

(working on a macbook pro 2019 16")

Disabling GPU performance will not resolve everyone's issue unfortunately. Disabling GPU performance seems to avoid extremely long slowdowns when selecting complex objects for me, however it makes the entire program much slower and clunkier with each step or action I take. This definitely is not a solution for people experiencing some of the extreme lag being discussed here. For my own issue, I keep GPU performance enabled for a better experience but I have to try to avoid using the direct selection tool to make any large selections of complex objects otherwise the program will hang. Hiding Edges is another workaround that helps workaround my issue, however edges are usually crucial when you are trying to view the anchors and segments you are trying to move, align, or snap to. I'll only disable "Show Edges" when I find I am about to perform a step that will result in really bad lag.

I also have an iMac that is over 11 years old at the moment that out performs my current 5-year old 2015 iMac running the oldest supported version of Illustrator for High Sierra. The 2015 iMac has improved hardware but again, I think the hardware may be related to the issue.

This issue has to be addressed and narrowed down to specific hardware, operating system or software combinations that seem to be experiencing more extreme lag.

Is the Adobe team making any progress troubleshooting this issue and finding a solution for the next version?

Go To Edit > Preferences > Performance

Untick the GPU Performance

My Illustrator runs normal & fast.

i5 2nd gen, 8GB ram, on board video card - 10 yrs old computer worth less than $100 now. nothing fancy :-)

Glad to see it's not just me.
I have a 6-core 5.2GHz CPU, GTX 1080Ti, 32gb DDR4 3400 RAM.

I've run extensive hardware tests in Prime 95, Aida Extreme, Furmark, 3D Mark, and Memtest 86 to absolutely guarantee that my computer is running perfectly and can handle just about any task.

And it takes me 15 ******* seconds to resize a ******* rectangle on a ******* 64 x 64 pixel canvas with literally not even a single other ******* line on it.

The program itself is barely making a dent in my hardware, yet Illustrator is a ******* lag fest.

I even did a full reset of windows, installed illustrator as the very first program, and it still runs like the same old piece of ****. I'm a photographer and I've used your services for some time, but no joke this has caused me to cancel. I'm done with you. ******** adobe

On top of previously reported problems with the lag on 4K now AI will not even start up with a 4K screen attached. When I disconnect it, it starts no problem. I mean it is impossible to work like this... C'mon Adobe!

Using a brand new iMac Pro with 128gb! of RAM and a 10-core 3ghz processor (with the maximum graphics card installed), and Illustrator is still so insanely slow and clunky (even with no other apps running). Moving basic images or plain text around the screen or trying to resize anything causes it to move frame-by-frame stuttering across the screen. It's so unsmooth, laggy and annoying to work with.

I have bought about 2 weeks ago a maxed out version of mac book pro 16-inch (i9 2,4ghz, 64gb ram, 5500M 8gb & 1tb ssd) and Illustrator behaviour is the same like on my maxed out iMac 2019. I think the illsutrator is poor optymized on macs. Don't add new features like live drawing if the apps is so slow and not smooth in any operations you make. You can work but is really disturbing my workflow. Please optimized Illustrator on macs like it works on PC (windows) machines.

1. Resizing vector shapes like rectangle, circle, triangle have a laggy feeling and some kind of delay/latency.
https://youtu.be/HBO0pH_ee3A

2. Moving canvas is so laggy
https://youtu.be/jRbf0-3o7Mk

3. Overall comparison Adobe products to the lower end windows machine and how the Adobe is much more optimized on PC Dekstops…
https://youtu.be/mtCttOjDMeM

Ever since Adobe moved development of CS onto a Windows environment we Mac users have had to suffer extremely poor, bug riddled software. This slow Illustrator issue has been going on for years and yet Adobe pretend they've never heard of it.

Very poor customer service.

Okay glad to see I'm not the only one with this problem. I have a few objects that contain a complex pattern and moving them or adjusting their size is completely impossible. I know 16GB of ram isn't a huge amount, and I'm fine with things being slow, but these objects are completely unresponsive. I click and drag, then get the spinning beach ball, and when the cursor comes back nothing has changed. Spent over an hour trying to adjust these objects and had the same problem every single time.

I have also the same issue when I embedded images in an illustrator file.

If I save the file the memory goes from 400 MB to 12,5 GB to 23+ GB and blocked the RAM completely.
More than a hour need it to save the file.

I tried with a few variations of settings (ai version with pdf, compression or without).

I think that illutrator has a problem with embedded big images in an ai.
My solution at the moment is save the ai in the verion 2019 without pdf and compressions. That works good.

Fuuuuck i'm getting so frustrated...
I just got a new mac pro 16" 2,3 GHz i9 16GB and i can't even get illustrator to work smooth.
This is insane...

We are noticing significant slow down on Illustrator 2020 on Mac, with activity monitor showing Illustrator using 140% and above of the CPU, this can be when doing minor things, panning the canvas or moving an item etc. We also work with ESKO plugins and have completely ruled these out as having any issues/cause of the slow down, as we have tested Illustrator without ESKO and still getting exactly the same. This is not however all the time, it is quite intermittent, which is extremely annoying as it is very difficult to pinpoint exactly what you have done to cause the issue. The fact for us was 2018 was the only real stable version that everyone was using, however some have now moved to Catalina and 2018 is not supported (Thanks Adobe!!), 2019 is clearly no better, still laggy and crashes are through the roof. I have one mac here that is a clean mac (fresh OS install) and Illustrator 2020 will not open at all - crash report sent off to Adobe and heard nothing back from them - Great customer service.

I think the best thing Adobe can do is concentrate on getting a single version (2020) to work properly without trying to add loads of new features. We deserve to have a product that actually works as it is supposed to.

Saying that, the Free Distort Tool is well overdue for a refresh, it was the most pointless tool Adobe created!!

Just get this sorted!

Running it on windows 10. a file of 40 mb. it is taking me an EXTRA DAY - for real - to use it and make adjustments and save it. It takes forever to save. IF it does, as Illustrator crashes while saving. Al LOT :/

After 3 months ago I have reported the problem and also record a videos available on youtube and still no one and nobody from engineer team respond. Nothing has change to resolve this problem. You gave next prerelease version with... new features like live drawing and copy/paste artboards but the performance is still exactly the same on mac computers. Please Adobe admit that you are working on this issue and you you also noticed it !

1. Resizing vector shapes like rectangle, circle, triangle have a laggy feeling and some kind of delay/latency.
https://youtu.be/HBO0pH_ee3A

2. Moving canvas is so laggy
https://youtu.be/jRbf0-3o7Mk

3. Overall comparison Adobe products to the lower end windows machine and how the Adobe is much more optimized on PC Dekstops…
https://youtu.be/mtCttOjDMeM

I really frustrated of the software, it can't even handle a basic 500kb line artwork.... I'm using a 2017 MBP btw

The ONLY hope we have is that AI and ID (and Bridge) get the same "Hey, let's fix this because people hate us" treatment they finally gave Photoshop 21.x.x. So far, I'm not seeing it at all.