Sketchup 2026 gets boggy over time when using new graphics engine

SketchUp Pro
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1

This is a continuation of the issue identified in: Sketchup Pro 2026 gets "jerky" quicker than 2025 - memory use?

This issue is continuing. with the help of Claude I was able to identify temporary remedy. Going back to the classic graphics engine. Unfortunately, per the message sketchup gave me when changing back to the classic engine, I now cannot use the advanced new features such as ambient occlusion,etc. I’m now running much faster hardware than when this issue was originally identified.

The sketchup dev team needs to pay attention to this.

Here is my chat with Claude about this issue, (interestingly it referenced my original, now closed post above)

What information is there about sketchup performance? I have a house model, after using sketchup for a period of time, the application gets very sluggish. If I do a save it gets a little better, but continues to degrade. If I close the application, and restart, it is good again. Using taskmanager once the memory is above about 3gb,it starts to get bad. My machine is a recent gaming grade system, with 32gb memory, a 5070 gpu, ssd, 275hx core i9 ultra cpu. Sketchup is set to use the GPU. When the sluggishness happens, there is not high cpu or gpu usage.

Synthesized memory management root causes and diagnostic troubleshooting strategies

Good news: what you’re describing isn’t a hardware problem — it’s a well-documented SketchUp behavior, and your build is more than capable of running it well.

This is a known pattern, not your hardware

SketchUp’s own help documentation confirms this exact symptom: SketchUp can slowly use more memory the longer it’s open and you are actively modeling, and if you’ve been working for a few hours in a row, saving your work and closing SketchUp — or restarting your device — can help. That’s precisely the save-helps/restart-fixes-it pattern you’re seeing. SketchUp

It’s also not unique to you — a SketchUp Pro user reported the identical threshold effect just a few months ago: 2025 would start getting jerky when memory use (per Task Manager) got close to 8GB, while 2026 exhibits the same issue around 5GB, and saving and restarting makes the problem go away for a while. Your ~3GB threshold fits the same pattern, just on the lower end. SketchUp Community

Why CPU/GPU stay quiet while it’s happening

This is the key clue. SketchUp is not GPU-limited like games or renderers — it’s CPU-bound by a single-threaded geometry kernel that cannot leverage multiple cores, so an expensive GPU sits mostly idle while a simple model crawls across the screen. But single-core CPU bottlenecks usually do show up as one core pegged at 100%. Since you’re seeing neither CPU nor GPU spike, the stutter is most likely coming from something in between: internal memory bloat inside SketchUp’s own process (heap fragmentation, huge undo stacks, thumbnail/texture cache rebuilding) causing pauses that Task Manager doesn’t register as “usage” the way a compute-bound task would. Hone

Likely contributors in a house model specifically

  • Undo history — every edit action stays in memory for the session; hours of modeling without clearing it adds up.
  • Unpurged data — your model stores all the components, styles, and materials you’ve added even after you’ve erased or replaced them, and they hang around taking up resources unless purged. Run Window > Model Info > Statistics > Purge Unused — this does more than a plain save. sketchup
  • Navigation itself adds memory — one user found simply orbiting, panning, or zooming could increase memory by 500MB+ within 10 seconds, separate from any actual edits. SketchUp Community
  • Extensions — background Ruby extensions (renderers, dynamic components, warehouse plugins) can leak memory quietly even when idle; poorly optimized plugins can degrade performance even when not actively in use. Hone
  • Textures/materials — a 4096×4096 texture uses 16 times more memory than a 1024×1024 one, and when VRAM fills, the system swaps to slower system RAM, causing viewport stuttering. House models pulled from 3D Warehouse often carry oversized textures without you realizing it. Hone

What to try

  1. Purge unused every save (not just save) — Window > Model Info > Statistics.
  2. Disable extensions one at a time to isolate whether one is leaking — disable extensions one by one in Extension Manager and test performance after each. Hone
  3. Keep the Ruby Console closed if you use it — leaving it open is a known drag on performance.
  4. Check texture sizes on any imported/warehouse components; downscale anything oversized.
  5. As a test, try switching to the Classic graphics engine (Preferences > Graphics) for a session to see if the degradation curve changes — this isolates whether the newer DirectX/Metal-based engine is part of it.
  6. Until root-caused, treat periodic save-and-restart as a legitimate workaround, not a failure — Trimble’s own guidance says to do this on long sessions.

If you’d like, I can connect to your live SketchUp session and pull actual model statistics (entity/component counts, unused data, texture sizes) to see what’s really driving the memory growth in your specific house model — just let me know if it’s open right now.

2

You needed Claude to tell you that if when you switch on the new engine your machine struggles and if you switch it off things are better?

What hardware are you running? I am guessing your forum profile is out of date.

Are your graphics drivers up to date?

How heavy is your model? Do you have a lot of imports from the 3dwarehouse? Can you share it?

Are your textures oversized?

Are you using environments?
Shadows on or off?
Are you using a style with heavy profile, sketchy edges or extensions?

Have you tried turning off all of your plugins to see if it improves?

3

Hi, you should tell your friend Claude to come to the forum, it’ll be easier to ask them questions directly.

Do you know what kind of hardware they have ? are both their version of windows and drivers up to date ? do you know how heavy / complex their work files are ?

edit : yes. yes it is.

4

So Claude recognised the pattern : The pattern is you and your own post from 6 months ago

Good Job Claude

Perhaps try sharing your model, there may be something in the way it is constructed (you previously shared stats of a model with 4000+ component instances - which in itself could be indicative of that) that puts strain on SketchUp - you can only brute force things so far with the HUGE pc upgrade you have had.

You are using a 3D connexion mouse - users with those often have issues with drivers.

What type of PC is it?

5

Well Claude AI has done a much better job of helping me find a work around to this buggy software than the majority of the smarmy responders here. This problem has followed my sketchup install across computers and different models. This is on new and up to date name brand hardware, with up to date drivers. It is not a problem with model size. Otherwise the slowness would appear immediately upon opening the model. It does not. Maybe sketchup is nothing more than a toy and I shouldn’t be wasting my money on the Pro desktop subscription. Trimble finance team take note!

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no. a complex model will eat up RAM faster than a non complex model, but it won’t be instant.

here is an analogy.

if you grab a 50kg cement bag, you’ll get tired quicker than if you don’t get a bag. but you won’t collapse immediately will you ?

it takes my sketchup about an hour to reach 3gb/32 with an almost empty file.
It takes less than 10 min with the current one I’m working on. because, guess what, complex things use more ram than simple ones.
shocking.

well, to be fair to us, you didn’t answer a frikking question we asked. let me re-ask them for you in a passive agressive way (i.e by just quoting them all again):

you came this morning to complain. we asked a lot of very specific questions, including “can you provide a frikking file?” and you’ve come back this evening “well, you’re not helping, unlike my friend claude, bwawawa”

ffs man.

maybe. have you asked Claude what it thinks about this issue ?

one thing I can tell you is that they don’t care.

cheerio.

7

You could answer some of the posted questions. We can’t read minds, much less magically teleport to your machine and start diagnosing you problem.

I’m guessing your profile is out of date, so we don’t really know what hardware you are using:

IMG_9592
IMG_95921179×1475 168 KB

You also haven’t shared a problem file.

What exactly did you do that Claude suggested that helped with your problem?

8

I switched back to the classic graphics engine. The problem is either gone or greatly reduced. At the cost of some functionality I don’t currently use.

The model has few/no textures, just a lot of edges and surfaces. Well grouped or components. Style in use is construction or other simple style.

This is not (should not be) a model is to heavy issue. This is some kind of issue with the way that sketchup handles its internal data structures, memory, multi-threading (or lack thereof) as the model is worked on during a design session. This problem has persisted across hardware, sketchup versions, OS versions, etc. The hardware is a recent version of the same Dell line as is in my profile.

I’m not going to play wack-a-mole trying to solve this issue by updating this or that, uploading my model, updating my profile and other nonsense. My primary purpose of this post is to highlight that there are some ongoing structural software problems with Sketchup that need attention. Hopefully that attention will be by someone at Sketchup that can make a difference. Aaron of youtube channel fame, are you listening?

9

Great, good luck.

¯_(ツ)_/¯

10

By keeping your profile up to date with the correct info, it means that all the helpful people on here know what version of Sketchup you are using, and what operating system/graphics card etc you are working with.

Often the answer is dependant on such things. Your operating system may be out of date and no longer able to handle the version of Sketchup you are using. Or the latest version of Sketchup may require you to manually update a graphics driver for best performance.

These are the reasons you were asked about updating your profile. If you give people the correct info at the beginning then they are in a better position to help you. I realise that you mentioned in your posts that you’re using a new PC but often the helpers will click to your profile first.

The guys that commented and attempted to help are some of the best most proficient and helpful Sketchup users on this Forum.

Posters often get asked to upload their model as sometimes a fresh set of eyes can notice something. Perhaps you’ve got something you’ve downloaded from the 3D warehouse that’s causing an issue, or somewhere along the way you’ve modelled a part with a ridiculously high number of edges.

I’m not saying you’ve done any of those things, but these guys deal with a lot of files where something like this has happened. And uploading your model really does help…sometimes.

Perhaps, if you had uploaded the file, one of the experts could’ve spotted something, or immediately realised it was a 100% software problem and validated your anger.

After all, it’s better to have a genuine human with decades of Sketchup experience agree with you, rather than AI.

11

so you say. I guess you’ll never really know. what you call “model with no heavy issue” other might call “oh my god what’s wrong with that model?”
oh, and no CAD software does multi threading. I wish AI assistants stopped giving that as a possible solution.

there are problems with sketchup. but as I read your messages, nothing really comes to mind, no specific problem.
on the other hand, we see profiles like yours on a daily basis, having problems caused by the way they modelled.
and until all the obvious usual suspects are ruled out, I guess you’ll never know.

hahaha, sure, they’ll then have someone from tech support take your case, and they’ll ask for details about your machines, then ask you to do all sorts of updates and procedures, and maybe even ask you to provide a file to see if it could be related to your modelling.

sounds familiar ? yeah, tech support and forum sages have a very similar textbook

anyway, good luck and have fun !