Word has been floating around that Avid Media Composer 2026.8 will be shutting down third-party NEXIS/ISIS emulation, potentially breaking sharing and bin locking for facilities using storage from companies other than Avid. This important change first went around social media (as far as I could tell) and an official Avid Knowledge Base article discussed this as well.

While not mentioned specifically by Avid, most discussion centered on Mimiq, the de facto go-to tool for Media Composer editing when you wanted to use third-party shared storage with collaborative features such as shared projects and bin locking. Mimiq was acquired by Hedge several years ago and has been a reliable tool ever since. 

Media Composer 2026.8 isn’t available yet, and time will bring more clarity. Avid is not eliminating third-party shared storage entirely as Avid itself will support third-party-storage collaboration workflow with Media Composer Enterprise. 

Here’s the skinny …

It’s all a little bit confusing but here’s how I understand things work / will work across the board. This is based on information gleaned from Avid’s communication with resellers. The Avid native bin locking and shared storage option has always worked perfectly on Avid storage. That’s why you’ve always needed Avid’s hardware, whether that be anything in their line from Unity to ISIS to NEXIS, to use Avid’s legendary collaborative editing tools. It was the file system set up on their proprietary hardware working with Media Composer software that made bin locking and the collaboration features work.

With the upcoming Media Composer 2026.8, bin locking and the like is moving, it seems, from the hardware storage/software setup right into the Media Composer software application itself. So, if you’re running Media Composer Enterprise, you’ll be able to use shared storage whether it’s from the more established companies that have some bin locking tools already on their hardware, such as from EditShare or Facilis or pretty much any regular network-attached storage. You’ll also be able to use all of Media Composer’s shared project and bin locking technology on cloud-based storage solutions such as LucidLink, Suite Studios, or Shade. There are users currently using the cloud options with Mimiq, but this won’t be necessary, or even possible, with 2026.8.

After 2026.8, if you’re using Avid-made shared storage, you will get bin locking and project sharing tools in the paid versions of Media Composer, which include Standard, Ultimate and Enterprise.

Avid isn’t abandoning third-party storage

Rather than simply killing “unauthorized third-party storage emulation”, Avid will build a supported path into Media Composer Enterprise. And it looks like that will be a $99 upgrade path.  According to Avid, Media Composer Enterprise 2026.8 will provide shared projects on third-party storage without requiring the third-party NEXIS-emulation approach used by earlier workflows.

All the discussion I’ve seen so far have been on social media and it sounds like with Enterprise 2026.8 Avid might be working directly with storage vendors to validate their products with the new workflow.

What happens to your Media Composer Ultimate sub?

If you’re running Media Composer Ultimate and using third-party storage with NEXIS emulation for bin locking and shared projects, there are essentially two choices. Stay where you are and keep working. Which isn’t unusual for Avid facilities, as they are often years behind in both Media Composer versions and OS versions. Avid explicitly says that customers who remain on their current version do not need to take action. If you want to move to Media Composer 2026.8 (or future versions) and retain shared projects and bin locking with third-party storage, you’ll need Media Composer Enterprise.

Speaking of the Enterprise upgrade …

The $ 99-per-license Media Composer Ultimate-to-Enterprise upgrade hasn’t been confirmed in official Avid channels that I’ve been able to find. But it’s worth noting that Enterprise 2026.8 includes:

• The features of Media Composer Ultimate
• PhraseFind
• ScriptSync
• Symphony
• Shared Projects on third-party storage
• The VM option, which was previously a separate paid option
• Enterprise administration tools

And, importantly, the new Avid-supported third-party-storage workflow means users may no longer need a separate third-party bin-locking product such as Mimiq for this purpose. And Mimiq isn’t cheap as it can run up to $500 for a license but it’s been a solid choice.

So this might come down to cost. Media Composer Ultimate runs around $540 per year with an annual subscription.

Media Composer Enterprise?

Avid doesn’t seem to publish an Enterprise cost right on the Avid site, as they say, “Talk to us.” But B&H sells a yearly license for $900, so that gives us an idea of Enterprise cost.

So that’ll be a number of cost factors to consider when all this goes officially official. Another big cost factor is that those shared storage systems won’t be tossed into the dumpster because they often serve admirably for years, and you don’t want a software change to render your perfectly usable hardware obsolete. The Media Composer 2026.8 update might be shipping at the end of August, according to some of that social media discussion, so that gives Avid editors and facilities a little bit of time to perhaps ponder what to do next.