Apple Unveils "Metal 2" Graphics API, Better Performance & Capabilities For VR

Well, it doesn't look like Apple is going to abandon their in-house "Metal" graphics API in favor of the Vulkan industry standard for high-performance graphics... Apple used WWDC today to announce Metal 2.

Metal 2 is the next major update to the Apple graphics API for iOS and macOS. The big result of Metal 2 is that it's suitable for VR on macOS. In fact, Valve is now bringing SteamVR to macOS with Metal 2, assuming you have a Mac with a graphics card powerful enough for virtual reality. Apple is also supporting external graphics cards with MacBooks via Thunderbolt, with their Thunderbolt 3 dev kit using a Radeon RX 580.

Metal 2 has big improvements for draw calls, improved debugging, a faster debugger, GPU counter access, a reworked display pipeline with VR in mind, support for viewport arrays, GPU queue priorities, and more.

Overall it's a sizable update for Apple's Metal API, but so far haven't found any real features of it not already found in Vulkan. Apple also still appears to be keeping Metal 2 in-house with no signs of supporting this API outside the Apple space.