How much RAM is good for video editing?

Modern video editing software often demands high performance from your hardware. Along with having a fast multicore processor and a decent graphics card, you’ll also need an adequate amount of RAM when using a video editor. While the computer with 4 GB of RAM  will barely handle office tasks such as browsing the web or checking e-mail, you will need a minimum of 8 GB of memory to at least run a video editing application.

That said, the ultimate goal of creating a video editing workstation should be a smooth and enjoyable editing and preview experience. You don’t want to end up having an irritating wait time for every other edit operation on your timeline. With that in mind, let’s find out: how much ram for video editing?

Why Is RAM  Important For Creating Videos?

Let’s start with the minimum memory required to run the operating system. The most popular, the Windows 10 operating system, currently consumes around 3GB of RAM on its own, without running other apps. It translates to at least 4 GB of memory if you want to run the operating system and some apps on it.

Now let’s add at least 1 GB of memory consumption when running the most popular video editing suite - Adobe Premiere Pro. Now you need a minimum of 5 GB of RAM to run Windows and other Premiere Pro programs. Going further, opening a long 1080p video project will also consume around 1 GB of memory, which will end up requiring at least 6 GB of RAM on your computer.

Effects And Consumption Of Transition Memory:

You will undoubtedly use various video modifiers such as color correction, stabilization, crossfades, and other editing techniques to achieve the desired result. Will all of this require RAM? Of course, yes! The more you edit your video, the more RAM the open project will consume. In the case of minimal random access memory resources, your computer will start swapping parts of the video project to an SSD or hard drive (worst case).

Video Preview Memory Usage:

Last but not least, the memory-intensive operations of video editing software: this is a preview window. After you’ve applied different effects and transitions, you’ll probably want to see what you expect before you start rendering. Now any changes you have applied to a video will need to be stored in RAM before it can be previewed.

After performing the editing and previewing parts of the video-making process, we can estimate about 2 GB of additional RAM needed to complete the edit from start to finish. With all the estimated memory consumption in place, we end up with a minimum of 8 GB of RAM necessary for a computer capable of video editing. 

Is Rendering Speed Affected By  Ram Size?

The short answer is - YES. Will the rendering be twice as fast with 16 GB of memory instead of 8 GB, Or will 16 GB be enough? The answer is no! Several tests from different video makers show that 2x or 4x more RAM will not reduce render time by the same amount. That said, tests have shown that having 32 GB of memory installed will mean about 3040 seconds less time spent rendering a short 5-minute clip.

What Is The Recommended Ram Size For The Different Video Resolutions?

Depending on the desired resolution and color levels, you may need to install more or less RAM. The enormous memory consumption would be  8K video editing, but at the moment, this format is not that popular and is rarely used. The 4K format, on the other hand, is widespread and is often requested for commercial purposes. Below, I will list the recommended RAM sizes for different video resolutions and show how much ram to edit a 4k video? 

HD 720p video: 8 GB will suffice, although 16 GB would be better for smoother system performance.

Full HD 1080p video: 16 GB recommended for fast response times and more efficient work.

2K Video: At least 16 GB is required for comfortable editing and rendering.

2160p 4K UHD Video - Aim for 32 GB of RAM in your system. Anything less will make your experience less than satisfactory. 

Video 4320p 8K UHD - You will need 64 GB of RAM to work at this resolution.

What Is The Recommended Ram  For Any Type Of Video Editing?

Although 4K is trendy and widespread right now and supported by online streaming services like YouTube and others, in most cases, it still edits 1080p videos. So a video editing workstation with 16 GB of RAM can solve the problem. Also, most video producers do not recommend using more than 16 GB of RAM for day-to-day video editing, regardless of the video editing software you are using. In my part, I  recommend this, at least for all types of video editing.

But I  still recommend choosing the 32GB install. Will you ask why? The point is that in addition to the video editing tools that run most of the time, there are other applications that you would love to have open at the same time. The widespread Chrome uses about 200 MB of RAM for each open tab. You may need to use another running content creation program. For example, many video professionals can also use photo editing applications such as Photoshop to create images quickly.

Recommended Ram Size For Video Editing:

In addition to the applications you actively use, background processes run on every computer, even if you don’t notice them. All of them inevitably consume more or less memory. Another nice thing about reserving the 32GB RAM  is that you can render 4K videos in the future. Even if you’re not thinking about 4K right now, you’ll likely need this resolution later if you want. Given that RAM costs are pretty low, why not add this feature ahead of time?

Conclusion:

The minimum  RAM for video editing is currently 8GB. On the other hand, you can edit 4K video but still run other programs, and the recommended amount of RAM  you can use is 32GB. Choosing a computer with this amount of memory ensures the smoothest possible editing and never runs out of memory, no matter how complex your video project may be. 64GB isn’t the best ram for video editing purposes right now. We recommend installing that amount of RAM only if your main goal is to produce 8K videos. Anything less than this requires a massive amount of memory or has no benefit.