It can be very frustrating if you are trying to perform a task in Solidworks and the application isn’t responding to your commands or if its response is very slow. Solidworks slowness is caused by various reasons, including a huge assembly you were working on in the program or a fault in a third-party application or software if it is connected to your computer. Solidworks is CPU-demanding. Therefore, Solidwork’s performance will be affected and run slowly if your workstation or PC does not meet the system requirements.

Most Common Reasons Why Solidworks Is Running Slow

Working with Solidworks requires a significant investment of time and resources on the part of your computer. It’s simple to get caught up in creating 2-dimensional or 3-dimensional designs while working on a large scale and forget how to maintain your Solidworks working at its full potential. Learn the most common reasons why Solidworks is running slow. Your workflow will noticeably improve once you know how to prevent what causes this slowness. 

1. Overloading the Processor: Solidworks is CPU-intensive software. Therefore, your PC or workstation CPU may become overwhelmed or overloaded with tasks. It cannot react to requests for CPU time when it operates at over 80% capacity or when its queue is too large, which might cause the entire modeling process on Solidworks to slow down. The processor for your PC or workstation should be top-notch Intel or AMD with SSE2 capability. 

A computer clock speed of 3.0 GHz or above is recommended for frequent Solidworks use. In general, a higher clock speed is more useful than numerous cores in an application like Solidworks, which employs serial rather than parallel processing. As of this writing, the fastest Solidworks processor is the Intel Core i7 12700K 12-Core, which can do most typical modeling tasks in Solidworks, such as loading and saving files, rebuilding assemblies, and rotating models.

2. Full or Almost Full Capacity Drive: Your drive is important to consider when Solidworks is running slow. Your Solidworks could be running slowly if your drive is at maximum capacity or the drive your computer or workstation is using is naturally slow. It would help if you worked from your local disk when you accessed or saved files in Solidworks. Therefore, the faster your drive’s read and write capabilities, the better. The standard for modeling is usually a solid-state drive, but solid-state drives are more expensive and have less storage space. However, they outperform traditional hard disk drives in terms of performance and are easier to defragment. Therefore, you should check the type of drive you are using to run Solidworks and if your drive still has enough space. 
3. Poor Network: You should avoid attempting to work with files over the network. When you do so, it makes your Solidworks run slowly. When you try to work over the network and the files aren’t on your local computer, temporary versions are created in your directory when you access them. The system notes every change made to those temporary files; the original files are modified each time you save. Solidworks will take longer to load because of all that traffic over the network. To prevent those glitches, copy the files or save your work locally on your computer. Additionally, you can avoid working over the network by using locally cached copies or software like Solidworks PDM. When it comes to performance, you should avoid working with files from a network.
4. Faulty Issues: Different types of faulty issues can cause your Solidworks application to run slowly. These faulty issues can be from faulty drivers of your workstation or PC to the files you are working on being faulty.  
5. Solidworks Setting: Every application has its own default settings, and the Solidworks application is no different. Some default settings on Solidworks would make the application perform slow if you use a low-end PC or workstation and do not make changes to these settings. Below are a few of them. 

a. Many Add-ins That Load On Start-Up

An excessive number of add-ins installed in your Solidworks program might cause it to function slowly. By using the drop-down option next to Tools/Options and then add-ins, you may choose which add-ins are loaded during startup if your instance of Solidworks is starting slowly. 

The popup will show you the estimated load time for each add-in and allow you to select which add-ins will load automatically at startup. Deselect an add-in from this menu if you don’t use it every time you run Solidworks.

b. High Image Quality

Another factor that might cause your Solidworks to operate slowly is a high image setting. A higher image setting causes model rebuilding to be slower. One technique to improve Solidworks performance is to reduce picture quality by going to Tools, then Options, and finally Document Properties. You can decrease image quality at higher settings by sliding both slider bars to low (faster) and deselecting the boxes to optimize edge length and improve curve quality.

  

c. Turn off preview when loading

While a file is loading, Solidworks always displays a rough preview. It looks beautiful but slows down the loading process, making Solidworks run slowly. You can turn off the preview by navigating to Solidworks System Options, selecting Performance, and picking the “No preview” during the open (faster) option.

d. There are some general settings you can consider that may cause Solidworks to run slowly. They include: Uncheck “Show thumbnail graphics in Windows Explorer,” check “Enable feature freeze bar,” and “Rebuild errors: prompt,” uncheck “Show the latest technical alerts and news in the welcome dialog.”

Conclusion

I hope this article assists you in identifying and understanding the most common reasons why Solidworks is running slow. Knowing these reasons ensures you can avoid them and does not prevent you from accomplishing your tasks presently and in the future. Understanding the causes will also let you resolve various user, hardware, and software issues for instant Solidworks performance and speed improvements.