AMD shows off DX12-related rendering advances that make game engines more efficient and less dependent on the CPU -- demo shows a 64% improvement

Radeon GPUs.

At GDC 2024, AMD announced it's adding draw calls and mesh nodes as part of Work Graphs — moving these features from the CPU to the GPU, with the aim of improving gaming performance. AMD showed off benchmark numbers of Work Graphs with mesh shaders running on an RX 7900 XTX, revealing a 64% performance improvement compared to normal Work Graphs without mesh shaders applied.

Before we dive into these features, what exactly are Work Graphs? They are a new GPU-driven rendering design built into the Direct3D 12 API that enables the GPU to apply work to itself. In Work Graph-enabled applications, this means that certain parts of the 3D rendering pipeline can be controlled and rendered on the GPU, independently of the CPU, reducing potential bottlenecks and improving efficiency and performance.