Native Windows ARM support in Blender
Blender 4.3 marked the first official release that could run on Windows ARM (WoA) devices, thanks to a collaboration between Microsoft, Linaro and Qualcomm. The effort was funded by Qualcomm as a Patron‑level member of the Blender Development Fund, allowing the core team to iterate on an ARM64 build that works on Snapdragon‑based Windows laptops and tablets.
Vulkan backend for high‑performance viewport
Starting with Blender 4.5 LTS, a Vulkan graphics API backend is available on Windows ARM. When enabled in Preferences → System, Vulkan replaces the legacy OpenGL path for the EEVEE viewport, delivering smoother playback and faster shading on Adreno GPUs.
Benchmarks show a clear win
Internal testing on a Qualcomm® Adreno™ X1‑85 GPU recorded the following results for two demo scenes:
- EEVEE viewport playback: OpenGL – 13.2 fps (Tree Creature), 12 fps (Amy); Vulkan – 208 fps (Tree Creature), 45 fps (Amy).
- Render time: OpenGL – 12 s (Amy), 15 s (Tree Creature); Vulkan – 1.5 s (Amy), 48 s (Tree Creature).
These numbers illustrate a dramatic performance uplift when using Vulkan on the same hardware.
Future roadmap
The development team plans to extend hardware‑accelerated ray tracing to the Cycles engine by 2026, leveraging SYCL on Snapdragon GPUs. This would bring real‑time‑like ray tracing capabilities to Windows ARM devices.
Getting started
Users can download the latest Windows ARM build from blender.org or obtain nightly builds from builder.blender.org. After installation, enable the Vulkan backend in the system preferences and report any issues via the built‑in Help → Report a Bug menu.
Credit goes to the teams at Linaro, Qualcomm, and the Blender developers, including Anthony Roberts, Jeffrey Moguillansky, Mark Feldman, Nilesh Shah, and Janardhan Haryadi Ramesh.