Baldur’s Gate 3 (BG3): Vulkan or DirectX 11? Answered

Before you start up Baldur’s Gate 3, you may notice that you have a choice to run it in two different APIs. One is Vulkan, and the other is DirectX 11. API stands for ‘application programming interface’. It’s basically a way for computer programs to communicate with each other. If you’re not tech-savvy and aren’t sure whether to run Baldur’s Gate 3 with Vulkan or DirectX 11, I will help you decide between the two.

Should you choose Vulkan or DirectX 11 for Baldur’s Gate 3?

This can be a difficult decision if you have no idea what either API does. To simplify the situation, the answer to which API you should run Baldur’s Gate 3 I suggest using Vulkan instead of DirectX 11. Why is that? Well, the first reason you should choose Vulkan is because it’s the default API. The developers are recommending that you choose Vulkan over DirectX 11. But why is that?

Running Baldur’s Gate 3 in the Vulkan API will give you better performance. If you’re playing this Dungeons & Dragons RPG game on a higher-end PC, I recommend that you stick with Vulkan. It’s also said to work best with Baldur’s Gate 3, so there’s really only a few reasons why you’d choose DirectX 11 instead.

Screenshot via Larian Studios

Playing the game with DirectX 11 will change the way your game looks and runs. If your PC is having trouble running Baldur’s Gate 3 in Vulkan, you may need to switch APIs. Back when the game was first in Early Access, DirectX 11 was preferred since Vulkan was unstable and still being perfected. But now that Baldur’s Gate 3 is leaving Early Access, Vulkan is a lot more stable now.

Try out Baldur’s Gate 3 in Vulkan first, and see if it works with your PC. If the graphics are too much to handle, or you’re experiencing frequent crashing, try DirectX 11. The game may look a little worse, but the good thing is that it’ll run smoothly.

Baldur’s Gate 3 is available on Steam.