Recommended system requirements for Adobe CC.

TLN5 wrote:

You start off opening an image in Bridge, do some adjustments in Camera Raw, open it in Photoshop, then you might bring that image into Illustrator or InDesign before finishing off in Acrobat before sending the work off on it’s merry way. That means you could have four or five of the Adobe cpu hungry apps open at once.

Did you mean to say CPU hungry? Or RAM hungry?

An application that is open in the background, but that isn't doing much of anything, hopefully isn't directly taking many CPU cycles. But it still will be taking up RAM and virtual memory space, and possibly contributing to system slowdowns related to swapping.

Adobe recommends at least 16GB RAM. I wouldn't go any lighter than that.

I have Intel iMacs - i5 & i9 running Adobe CC Photoshop & Lightroom as well as CaptureOne Pro, PortraitPro Studio, DaVinci Resolve and Screenflow. 32GB RAM. Never had a problem running any of them.

Just because you may have all 6 apps running does not mean that they are actively consuming CPU cycles or RAM. While they each have some basic RAM needs, in most cases they use RAM on an as-needed basis depending on the size images/projects that are open & what you may be doing with them at any moment. For example, right now, with PS CC idling, it is taking only 1.57GB RAM - a far cry from the 16GB RAM Adobe recommends. Keep in mind that the Adobe recommendation is based on their estimate of total system need including average image/project sizes when using the CC apps.

Are you really running all the apps you mentioned as a continuous workflow, or are you just asking out of curiosity?

TLN5 wrote:

When I wrote cpu that was my shorthand for computing. I wasn’t being specific. From what you say, if minimum requirement for one application open is say 8RAM, then having four open would require 32RAM?

Adobe recommends 16 GB minimally.

https://helpx.adobe.com/creative-cloud/system-requirements.html

I’d go with somewhat more, as app requirements and macOS requirements aren’t likely to shrink.

And remember that macOS itself and its active apps and giblets have to fit in main memory, too.

The math on memory usage isn’t straightforward here (or in general), as apps and app data that’s not immediately active can get swapped out from main memory into main storage, then swapped back in when becoming active again. On recent systems, this swapping is very fast.

If you want to reduce or avoid swapping, yes, you will need more memory. But at some point, you can’t switch between apps as fast as macOS can swap out other inactive apps and then swap in apps that you now want active, or apps that just got work to do arriving from elsewhere.

Apple also uses available main memory as a cache too, which avoids accessing comparatively slower storage.

Comparatively slower? Main storage has gotten much faster. Apple silicon main storage nowadays is about as fast as main memory found in a 2020-era computer.

In addition to the info from the replies above, might want to ask the folks in Adobe forums what they suggest.

TLN5 wrote:

From what you say, if minimum requirement for one application open is say 8RAM, then having four open would require 32RAM?

You wouldn't necessarily need 32 GB of RAM, because

• You might close documents as you moved from one application to the other (leaving just the application open).
• The performance effect of swapping out part of the virtual memory space of background applications might be less obvious than that of swapping out part of the virtual memory space of the foreground one.

Servant of Cats wrote:

You wouldn't necessarily need 32 GB of RAM

May I add that the applications by themselves don't hog the minimum stated RAM (8GB RAM in the case of PS CC) because that 8GB minimum requirement is based on a projection of total system need in order for the app to perform, which would include the RAM expected to be required by macOS & some basic image/project and probably some headroom for other apps that may be open. So, no, 4 applications each with an 8GB RAM requirement does not mean that you would need 32GB to run all 4 at the same time.

Example, at present on my i7 MBP, macOS + Firefox, Dropbox, some helpers & services are using 5.11 GB, PS is idling at 1.57GB = 6.68GB RAM total. So, you can see why Adobe says the minimum requirement is 8GB.

MrHoffman wrote:

…Apple silicon main storage nowadays is about as fast as main memory found in a 2020-era computer…

Ugh. Sorry. Should be 2010.