How to Join Creative Cloud Prerelease Programs
If you’re a developer building integrations, plugins, extensions, or even just writing scripts for Creative Cloud apps, it’s important to keep your work up to date with the latest Creative Cloud releases. The best way to say ahead of the game is to join the prerelease program of the app or apps you develop for (for example; Photoshop and Illustrator) as well as the prerelease groups for tools you might use every day, like the ExtendScript Debugger plugin for VSCode or ExManCmd.
UPDATE July 24th, 2020: After Effects, Audition, Illustrator, Media Encoder, and Premiere Pro are now available in the Beta Apps section of the Creative Cloud Desktop app for all users. Read the Beta Apps FAQ here.
How to join our prerelease groups
In general, all Creative Cloud prerelease programs are available at https://www.adobeprerelease.com/. However, some prerelease groups are invisible to users without a prior invitation.
Additionally, prerelease groups usually require you to sign a non-disclosure agreement, (also known as an NDA,) with Adobe. This sounds restrictive, but the good thing about it is that Adobe employees can talk more openly about upcoming features in the prerelease forums than they can in public forums.
Here’s a list of prerelease groups, alphabetically by app, so you can easily find the groups you’d like to join. Please note that I have included direct links, even to groups that require an invitation. This way, if you’ve previously joined and forgotten about it, you can jump right back in:
- After Effects — E̶m̶a̶i̶l̶ ̶B̶r̶u̶c̶e̶ ̶B̶u̶l̶l̶i̶s̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶a̶c̶c̶e̶s̶s̶.̶ Now available in the Beta Apps section of the Creative Cloud Desktop app, community feedback here.
- Audition — E̶m̶a̶i̶l̶ ̶B̶r̶u̶c̶e̶ ̶B̶u̶l̶l̶i̶s̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶a̶c̶c̶e̶s̶s̶.̶Now available in the Beta Apps section of the Creative Cloud Desktop app.
- Animate
- Bridge
- Character Animator — available in the Beta Apps section of the Creative Cloud Desktop app.
- Creative Cloud Desktop App
- Creative Cloud Developer Prerelease Group, which contains:
— ExManCmd
— ExtendScript Debugger for VSCode plugin prerelease
— CEP forum
— UXP forum - Dreamweaver
- DVA Integration Prerelease Group — Email Bruce Bullis for access.
— For testing Premiere Pro Integrations on “New World” scripting - InDesign
- InDesign Developer Prereleases
- InDesign Family SDK Download Program
- Illustrator
- Photoshop — E̶m̶a̶i̶l̶ ̶T̶h̶o̶m̶a̶s̶ ̶R̶u̶a̶r̶k̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶a̶c̶c̶e̶s̶s̶ ̶(̶o̶r̶ ̶E̶r̶i̶n̶ ̶F̶i̶n̶n̶e̶g̶a̶n̶ ̶i̶f̶ ̶T̶h̶o̶m̶a̶s̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶v̶a̶c̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶)̶.̶ Apply here: https://psprerelease.carrd.co/
- Premiere Pro — E̶m̶a̶i̶l̶ ̶B̶r̶u̶c̶e̶ ̶B̶u̶l̶l̶i̶s̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶a̶c̶c̶e̶s̶s̶.̶ Now available in the Beta Apps section of the Creative Cloud Desktop app, Community feedback here.
- Rush — Now available in the Beta Apps section of the Creative Cloud Desktop app.
- XD Private Prerelease — email xdplugindev1@adobe.com for access
Several of the prerelease programs above are also available in Japanese-langauge only groups. If you’ve installed Adobe Creative Cloud in Japanese, you should be able to see the Japanese language groups at https://www.adobeprerelease.com/.
When will I be approved?
In some of the groups above, access is granted automatically as soon as you sign the required NDA. Watch out for email with a subject line like “Welcome to… ” or “Invitation to join…” from “Adobe Prerelease” or noreply@adobe.com, which may be filtered out of your inbox.
Some groups require human approval that may take two or more business days while an admin approves your request to join. If you’re been waiting for a long period of time for your approval, reach out to Bruce Bullis for digital video or audio programs, or Erin Finnegan for anything else.
How to Download Prerelease Builds
If you’ve signed an NDA and been approved to join a prerelease group, you might be wondering where to find prerelease builds to download. Prerelease builds are typically located in the “Downloads” section of each group:
(You can also try adding #tab_downloads to the end of the prerelease group’s URL.)
Test, iterate, and leave feedback
After downloading and testing your plugin or integration on prerelease builds, please leave feedback if you find any bugs. Your feedback in the prerelease is vital to squashing bugs that might affect other developers as well.
Keep on top of new versions and discussions by adjusting your notification settings:
See you in the prerelease forums!
What are you waiting for? Apply and start downloading today.
If you’re stuck waiting for a long period of time for your approval, reach out to Erin Finnegan or Bruce Bullis.
