We regularly use SketchUp for Schools in our middle school tech program and lately, randomly throughout the day we are dealing with severe lag that makes SketchUp for Schools basically unusable. This usually effects about 10-15 computers at a time. Multiple hands go up and endless complaints from students about how awful it is. During these laggy periods we’ve tested our up/down internet speed and it’s normal, cleared cache, restarted, turned on/off hardware acceleration, logged out of everything we can think of. We are using Google Chrome on iMacs. We prefer Chrome as our district uses the Google ecosystem. Switching to Safari fixes this most of the time.
Hi @jsmall, thanks for the post. I am not familiar with the behavior you are describing but I can ask our resedent expert @Tori_SU is she has any ideas and report back once I know more.
In the meantime, can you share a model that is lagging?Sometimes we are able to glean some additional insights from the file. Hopefully we can get this figured out quickly and get you back up and running smoothly.
We have the same issue here at my school. Students have been using items that they made and it still lags. We have tried options online but nothing seems to be working to make it faster. There are just too many polygons.
Hello It is March 2025, and we are experiencing the same lag, but mostly it is only when you activate the MOVE tool from the toolbar. I have a ticket open, but no one is able to come up with any answers. I am convinced an update in Google Chrome that happened about 3 weeks ago now, is the problem. I have not allowed my chrome to update, it is still on ver 130, and I have no lag, but the student computers (macs) are on Chrome 133 and they are all having this problem. @jsmall Did you just have to wait for another update?
I’m not entirely sure what changed behind the scenes that made the lag go away. Perhaps there was some chrome/sketchup interaction that was causing it. Students would often just fire up Safari and that was out only workaround. We’re using it regularly on macs with chrome currently and we haven’t had the issue for a while.
We are still having this severe lag problem using the Sketchup for Schools. We use macs and google chrome. I think the problem is with intel mac vs the Apple M1 processor chip. I have a newer computer, the student computers are intel chip. Can anyone at Trimble PLEASE do anything to change the programming for this?? My computer has no issues, no lag when using Sketchup online, but the poor kids have the worst experience sometimes. No amount of restarting or clearing the cache does anything. I have to use these computers one more year and I cannot even think about having to teach nine weeks of 3D design with only tinkerCAD.
Hi @sshinabarger, thanks for reaching out and sorry to hear that the students are having trouble with SketchUp for Schools. Are the students using a lot of content from the 3D warehouse or high resolution images as part of their workflows? Complex models and large images can slow down most computers quickly. I am also curious if they are routinely purging unused content from their files. Old data can build up quickly and make lag worse.I would also recommend making sure that students model their work with the shadows turned off unless needed for a particular task as those calculations also add some additional lag. Also, have your students tried hiding objects via tags and/or turning on fog? those settings can help a lot too.
At the end of the day, proper modeling technique can help many computers to run faster.
As for comments on what is next for SketchUp for Schools, I am unable to offer any insight into that due to company policy. I can say that we are always looking for more feedback on SketchUp and are constantly trying to make it better. We have a few pretty exciting things being worked on right now.
No amount of restarting or clearing the cache does anything. I have to use these computers one more year and I cannot even think about having to teach nine weeks of 3D design with only tinkerCAD.