release

DirectX Tool Kit for DirectX 11

https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=248929

Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation.

May 7, 2026

This package contains the "DirectX Tool Kit", a collection of helper classes for writing Direct3D 11 C++ code for Win32 desktop applications for Windows 8.1 or later, Xbox One, and Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps for Windows 10 and Windows 11.

This code is designed to build with Visual Studio 2022, Visual Studio 2026, clang for Windows v12 or later, or MinGW. Use of the Windows 11 SDK (22000) or later is required for Visual Studio.

These components are designed to work without requiring any content from the legacy DirectX SDK. For details, see Where is the DirectX SDK?.

Directory Layout

• Inc\

  • Public Header Files (in the DirectX C++ namespace):

    • Audio.h - low-level audio API using XAudio2 (DirectXTK for Audio public header)
    • BufferHelpers.h - C++ helpers for creating D3D resources from CPU data
    • CommonStates.h - factory providing commonly used D3D state objects
    • DDSTextureLoader.h - light-weight DDS file texture loader
    • DirectXHelpers.h - misc C++ helpers for D3D programming
    • Effects.h - set of built-in shaders for common rendering tasks
    • GamePad.h - gamepad controller helper using XInput, Windows.Gaming.Input, or GameInput
    • GeometricPrimitive.h - draws basic shapes such as cubes and spheres
    • GraphicsMemory.h - helper for managing dynamic graphics memory allocation
    • Keyboard.h - keyboard state tracking helper
    • Model.h - draws meshes loaded from .CMO, .SDKMESH, or .VBO files
    • Mouse.h - mouse helper
    • PostProcess.h - set of built-in shaders for common post-processing operations
    • PrimitiveBatch.h - simple and efficient way to draw user primitives
    • ScreenGrab.h - light-weight screen shot saver
    • SimpleMath.h - simplified C++ wrapper for DirectXMath
    • SpriteBatch.h - simple & efficient 2D sprite rendering
    • SpriteFont.h - bitmap based text rendering
    • VertexTypes.h - structures for commonly used vertex data formats
    • WICTextureLoader.h - WIC-based image file texture loader
    • XboxDDSTextureLoader.h - Xbox One exclusive apps variant of DDSTextureLoader

• Src\

  • DirectXTK source files and internal implementation headers

• Audio\

  • DirectXTK for Audio source files and internal implementation headers

• MakeSpriteFont\

  • Command line tool used to generate binary resources for use with SpriteFont

• XWBTool\

  • Command line tool for building XACT-style wave banks for use with DirectXTK for Audio's WaveBank class

• build\

  • Contains miscellaneous build files and scripts.

• skills\

  • Contains published CoPilot skills for use by developers.

Documentation

Documentation is available on the GitHub wiki.

CoPilot Usage

For CoPilot CLI assistance with using DirectX Tool Kit, try:

winget install GitHub.Copilot
winget install GitHub.cli
gh skill install microsoft/directxtk
copilot
/skills list

Notices

All content and source code for this package are subject to the terms of the MIT License.

For the latest version of DirectXTK, bug reports, etc. please visit the project site on GitHub.

Release Notes

FOR SECURITY ADVISORIES, see GitHub.

For a full change history, see CHANGELOG.md.

• clang-format use for this project must match the version use by GitHub Super-Linter to pass the validation. VS 2022 and VS 2026 come with different versions, so to match use:

winget install --id=LLVM.LLVM --version 21.1.2
powershell -File build/Format.ps1 -LLVM

• The directxtk_desktop_win10 and directxtk_uwp NuGet packages are deprecated. The best way to integrate the latest DirectX Tool Kit into your C++ project is using vcpkg.

• The CMake projects require 3.21 or later.

• Starting with the July 2026 release, support for Direct3D Hardware Feature Level 9.x has been retired. All shaders are built using Shader Model 4, and therefore require D3D_FEATURE_LEVEL_10_0 or greater.

• Starting with the March 2025 release, Windows 7 and Windows 8.0 support has been retired. For DirectX ToolKit for Audio this means that DirectXTKAudio_Desktop_*_Win7 has been removed, and DirectXTKAudio_Desktop_*_Win8 has been integrated into the DirectXTK_Desktop_* vcxproj which uses XAudio 2.8 for Windows 8.1 compatibility.

  • Remove any References to or use of DirectXTKAudio_Desktop_*_Win8.vcxproj or DirectXTKAudio_Desktop_*_Win7. If using DirectXTK_Desktop_*.vcxproj you will be using XAudio 2.8 as before. Client code will need to build with _WIN32_WINNT=0x0603.

  • If you want to use XAudio2Redist with Windows 8.1, the CMake project supports this with the build option BUILD_XAUDIO_REDIST. The CMake build option BUILD_XAUDIO_WIN7 was renamed.

  • When using XAudio 2.8 for Windows 8.1, there is no xWMA format support. This is available when using XAudio 2.9 or XAudio2Redist.

• Starting with the February 2023 release, the Mouse class implementation of relative mouse movement was updated to accumulate changes between calls to GetState. By default, each time you call GetState the deltas are reset which works for scenarios where you use relative movement but only call the method once per frame. If you call it more than once per frame, then add an explicit call to EndOfInputFrame to use an explicit reset model instead.

• As of the September 2022 release, the library makes use of C++11 inline namespaces for differing types that have the same names in the DirectX 11 and DirectX 12 version of the DirectX Tool Kit. This provides a link-unique name such as DirectX::DX11::SpriteBatch that will appear in linker output messages. In most use cases, however, there is no need to add explicit DX11 namespace resolution in client code.

• Starting with the July 2022 release, the bool forceSRGB parameter for DDSTextureLoader Ex functions is now a DDS_LOADER_FLAGS typed enum bitmask flag parameter. This may have a breaking change impact to client code. Replace true with DDS_LOADER_FORCE_SRGB and false with DDS_LOADER_DEFAULT.

• As of the October 2021 release, the DGSLEffect no longer directly supports skinning. Instead, make use of SkinnedDGSLEffect which is derived from DGSLEffect.

• Starting with the June 2020 release, this library makes use of typed enum bitmask flags per the recommendation of the C++ Standard section 17.5.2.1.3 Bitmask types. This may have breaking change impacts to client code:

  • You cannot pass the 0 literal as your flags value. Instead you must make use of the appropriate default enum value: AudioEngine_Default, SoundEffectInstance_Default, ModelLoader_Clockwise, or WIC_LOADER_DEFAULT.

  • Use the enum type instead of DWORD if building up flags values locally with bitmask operations. For example, WIC_LOADER_FLAGS flags = WIC_LOADER_DEFAULT; if (...) flags |= WIC_LOADER_FORCE_SRGB;

• The UWP projects and the Win10 classic desktop project include configurations for the ARM64 platform. Building these requires installing the ARM64 toolset.

• When using clang/LLVM for the ARM64/AArch64 platform, the Windows 11 SDK (22000) or later is required.

• The CompileShaders.cmd script must have Windows-style (CRLF) line-endings. If it is