Vulkan is now the official graphics API for Android
Google’s biggest announcement today, at least as it pertains to Android, is that the Vulkan graphics API is now the official graphics API for Android. Vulkan is a modern, low-overhead, cross-platform 3D graphics and compute API that provides developers with more direct control over the GPU than older APIs like OpenGL. This increased control allows for significantly improved performance, especially in multi-threaded applications, by reducing CPU overhead. In contrast, OpenGL is an older, higher-level API that abstracts away many of the low-level details of the GPU, making it easier to use but potentially less efficient. Essentially, Vulkan prioritizes performance and explicit hardware control, while OpenGL emphasizes ease of use and cross-platform compatibility.
The main benefit of this change, according to Google, is that it enables developers to add more immersive visuals in their games. Vulkan allows developers to capitalize on the performance of modern smartphone GPUs to unlock features like ray tracing in games or multithreading. Games like Diablo Immortal and Pokémon TCG Pocket leverage the Vulkan graphics API to implement splashy special effects and optimize graphics across a broad range of devices.
Although Google says that it is now transitioning Android to a “modern, unified rendering stack with Vulkan at its core,” Android has actually supported the Vulkan graphics API since Android 7.0 Nougat’s release in 2016. The reason the company didn’t pursue this change earlier is simply due to fragmentation. Even a few years after Vulkan’s introduction to Android, only a small percentage of active devices supported it, and among those devices, only a handful offered robust support. Today, though, more than 85% of active Android phones support Vulkan, and over 45% of sessions from new Android games built on the Unity game engine use Vulkan. Support for Vulkan among Android devices is in a much better place now than it was several years ago, which is why Google feels comfortable making it the official graphics API for Android.
Better tooling and new pathways to launching games on Android
In addition to improving Vulkan support on Android, Google is also working to make it easier for developers to actually build games for Android. The company announced today that it had partnered with Unity Technologies to make Vulkan integration easier with the Unity game engine. In Unity 6, for example, developers can configure Vulkan on a per device basis. Meanwhile, older Unity versions can access this same setting through plugins.
Google also teamed up with the Samsung Austin Research Center to create a new open source profiler and debugger for Vulkan and AI/ML optimization. This new tool is an integrated GPU profiler toolchain that enables developers to make graphics, memory, and compute workloads more efficient. The tool will be launching later this year.
Next, Google says it has collaborated with MediaTek to optimize the Android Dynamic Performance Framework (ADPF) for MediaTek chips. ADPF is a feature that lets developers adjust the performance demands of their games in real-time based on the thermal state of the device. With MediaTek’s help, Google has made the ADPF more stable, allowing it to “provide longer and smoother gameplay sessions.” Furthermore, several game engines now offer built-in ADPF support, making it easier for game developers to integrate. The feature works on many existing devices without MediaTek chips, such as the Pixel 9 and Galaxy S25, so today’s announcement simply means ADPF is now available in more places and on more devices.
