Posted by Alisa Cassiel -
Contact Author
[Tech Help] GPU Acceleration Randomly Unavailable in Premiere Pro
If you are searching an easy solution, click here: The solution most recommended by us [85%]
When you attempt to boost the speed of video processing in Adobe Premiere Pro, the best way is to enable GPU acceleration. But sometimes GPU Acceleration option is available, sometimes not. You turn out to find that 100% of CPU is being used and the GPU is at 0% or 1% even though you are sure that Mercury Playback Engine is enabled. And it is still choppy, lagging, and even crashes sometimes.
Reasons Analysis
The reason of failing to enable GPU acceleration lies in Premiere Pro itself, GPU and driver's version, and others. This article will analyze them one by one to solve the problem for you.
1. Your graphics card and graphics driver don't meet the requirement of Premiere Pro
Whether a frame can be processed by Mercury Playback Engine GPU Acceleration depends on the size of the frame and the amount of RAM on the graphics card (VRAM). Adobe officially claims that it requires a GPU of 2GB VRAM at least, and it is better to have 4GB VRAM. As for graphics card, if it’s too old, it may not support Premiere Pro any more. For instance, Premiere Pro CC 2019 uses CUDA 9.2 are not supported in the NVIDIA driver from 2017.
2. Your graphics card hasn't been detected by Premiere Pro
Adobe Premiere Pro is set to enable built-in CPU acceleration. You need to activate GPU acceleration manually. Before you choose Mercury Playback Engine GPU Acceleration, Premiere Pro will detect and recognize the GPU on your computer. Once it fails, there are no chances to enable GPU acceleration.
3. A GPU does not speed up all processes.
GPU acceleration works in real-time preview and export rendering, which means it won't speed up video processing from the very beginning to the end. So if you see that GPU usage is lower, don't worry, it is just the proper rest time.
- How to fix GPU acceleration unavailable in Adobe Premiere Pro? – Update GPU or graphics driver
- How to recheck GPU acceleration in Adobe Premiere Pro? –Check GPU acceleration settings
- One click solution to GPU acceleration issues in video processing –Detect hardware info and enable full GPU acceleration
How to fix GPU acceleration unavailable in Adobe Premiere Pro? – Updater GPU or graphics driver
If you are searching how to solve GPU acceleration issues in Premiere, the most recommended solution is to buy an advanced GPU for your PC. It absolutely works. But it's pricy at the same time. For example, the most common GPUs recommended by others are GTX 1080Ti and RTX 2080, but they are far more than $400.
What's more, upgrading GPU is not available if you have a laptop where the GPU is unchangeable, so it's impossible to reinstall a new one. And here's another method, updating the GPU driver to the latest version.
Step 1. Figure out what graphics card you have
For PC: Start>Run>Type "dxdiag">Display
For Mac: Apple>About This Mac>Graphics
Step 2. Download current NVIDIA or AMD drives for your card from the official website.
Step 3. Install the current driver.
Step 4. Reboot the computer.
To meet the system requirement, you need to buy high-end GPUs and go though many complex checks or install current drivers, which is obviously a higher cost of money and time.
How to recheck GPU acceleration in Adobe Premiere Pro? – Check GPU acceleration settings
If your GPU has been upgraded or you have already had an advanced GPU, let's check whether it is working in Adobe.
Step 1. Restart Adobe Premiere Pro and import files.
Step 2. Click File> Project Settings> General> Renderer to recheck Renderer is Mercury Playback Engine GPU Acceleration.
Step 3. Check whether hardware acceleration work with VideoProc. Launch VideoProc and hit Option to check hardware info
Now you can see how GPU acceleration is going in your system, and then open Premiere Pro to verify if it runs faster.
If you need a potent hardware acceleration tool to enable GPU acceleration easily: 
Detect hardware info and enable full GPU acceleration.Easier & fast Solution
Adobe Premiere Pro requires high-end GPU and computer system, but for common devices, there should be some tools that are both easy-to-use and money-saving.
Download and install VideoProc to enable full GPU acceleration in video editing in just a few clicks!
VideoProc - One-stop Video Editor with Full GPU Acceleration
- Provide 47x real time fast video exporting
- A full set of video editing: cut, merge, rotate, crop, stabilize, denoise, etc.
- Support 420+ video and audio formats to import, edit, export and convert
- Convert and resize 1080p and 4K videos without compromising quality
Download VideoProc on Windows 
to edit videos with full GPU acceleration
Download VideoProc on Mac to edit videos with full GPU acceleration
Step 1. Open VideoProc. It will detect hardware on your computer automatically for the first time you install and launch it. Just let it be, and open the window when it finished.
Step 2. Hit Video button to import 4K, 1080p and other high-definition videos, or just drag the file to the program.
Step 3. Choose output format by clicking Target Format. Format preset based on media types, output devices and webs.
Step 4. Simply edit imported videos, like cut, merge, rotate, crop, denoise and more. VideoProc will develop more functions in the future for people in need of professional editing.
Step 5. Click Hardware Acceleration Engines. Choose output folder, and finally, click RUN to export the video.
Final Words:
For Adobe Premiere users, if you get any trouble with GPU acceleration, check the hardware info with VideoProc to solve it pertinently. On top of that, it allows you to edit videos simply, like cut, merge, crop, stabilize and denoise 4K videos shoot by iPhone, GoPro, DJI and 4K camcorders. It is also a powerful video downloader and converter covering MP4, MKV, MOV, FLV and hundreds of video formats.
That's all for troubleshooting problems of randomly unavailable GPU acceleration in Premiere Pro. Hope them work for you.
