Blown Away by Render Speeds: Adobe After Effects M1 Pro Review

As a motion graphics artist, I've always been cautious about performance increases in After Effects, an application that my freelance business relies heavily on every day. But, after upgrading to the new MacBook Pro with the M1 Max chip, I was blown away by the render speeds - at least in a very long time.

I've never been able to get a new machine that cuts my render times by 3X without spending over $10k. This is the first time I've seen such impressive results. In fact, my initial baseline test with my iMac and the same sequence in both Adobe After Effects 2021 and 2022 showed me just how much faster the newer version renders projects.

The new multi-frame rendering feature, which was missing since around 2014, has made a significant impact on render speeds. I wanted to get a good baseline test render using my iMac before moving on to the M1 Max MacBook Pro.

Just as I finished installing After Effects 2022, Adobe announced a new public beta that is M1-native. To my surprise, all apps are now M1-native except for After Effects, which will run under Rosetta 2. The new M1 Pro and M1 Max arrivals coincided with Adobe's Max event, where they released new 2022 versions of their entire suite of apps.

Would this be a different story than the last time I got a laptop to perform like a desktop? I ran over to my local Apple Store and picked up a Space Gray 16” MacBook Pro with the M1 Max chip, 64GB of RAM, and 4TB of storage. Then, Apple announced the new M1 Pro and M1 Max chips, along with loads of ambitious claims, making me wonder how my current projects could benefit.

As I started testing my projects on the new MacBook Pro, I was thrilled to see that After Effects rendered sequences much faster than before. In fact, the render speeds were so impressive that it's hard to believe they're coming from a laptop!

In conclusion, the Adobe After Effects M1 Pro has exceeded my expectations in terms of render speeds. With its multi-frame rendering feature and native support on Apple's new M1 chips, I'm confident that this will be a game-changer for motion graphics artists like me who rely heavily on After Effects every day.

Adobe after effects m1 pro