You can now use the Windows SDK to build great games for Windows. DirectX is now a fundamental part of Windows.īecause the Windows SDK is the primary developer SDK for Windows, DirectX is now included in it. In parallel, DirectX technologies are more integrated with Windows. Today, the availability of Direct3D hardware in computers drives even traditional desktop applications to use graphics hardware acceleration.

As DirectX technologies matured, they became relevant to a broader range of applications. We originally created the DirectX SDK as a high-performance platform for game development on top of Windows. If you need the documentation for previous DirectX versions, see Classic DirectX Graphics.Starting with Windows 8, the DirectX SDK is included as part of the Windows SDK. To learn about how to build a display driver for Windows 8, see Roadmap for the Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM). For more info about combining XAML and DirectX in a Windows app, see DirectX and XAML interop. You can use the Windows.UI::Xaml::Controls::SwapChainPanel class to create high-performance DirectX apps with a XAML UI overlay. To learn about how to create a Windows Store app that uses DirectX, see Create your first Windows Store app using DirectX. To compose bitmaps that Direct3D 11 or Direct2D populated, use DirectComposition.

For info about how to develop 3-D graphics with DirectX, see Create 3D graphics with DirectX.įor 2-D graphics and text, use Direct2D and DirectWrite rather than Windows Graphics Device Interface (GDI). Even if you have Microsoft Direct3D 9-level or Microsoft Direct3D 10-level hardware, you can use the Direct3D 11 API and target a feature level 9_x or feature level 10_x device. DirectX graphics includes support for high-performance 2-D and 3-D graphics.įor 3-D graphics, use the Microsoft Direct3D 11 API. Microsoft DirectX graphics provides a set of APIs that you can use to create games and other high-performance multimedia applications.

Microsoft directx 11 for windows 10