Software » Animation 3D » Blender 4.5.0

What’s New Recap
Round-up of what’s new in Blender 4.5 LTS, in detail.

New features overview by Jonathan Lampel from CGCookie, Harry Blends, Paul Caggegi, Wayne Dixon, Gleb Alexandrov, Aidy Burrows, and Károly Zsolnai-Fehér.
VULKAN
BLEND ME UP

The Vulkan backend is now fully supported in Blender 4.5 LTS

The final frontier.
After years of work, support for the popular backend in Blender is now on par with OpenGL.

It’s not enabled by default yet; make it so in the Preferences.

Make sure to keep your drivers up to date! Blender works closely with hardware manufacturers to ensure Vulkan performs as good as possible.

See the supported platforms and drivers, and the current limitations.

Blender 4.5 LTS Vulkan Preferences
Enable the Vulkan backend (Windows and Linux) under Preferences → System.
GEOMETRY NODES
BRING’EM ON

Got OBJ, CSV, STL, VDB, PLY, or a custom text file?
Bring them all together with Geometry Nodes.

Mix & Match
Assemble your scenes by importing all kinds of files.

CSV (.csv)
Stanford PLY (.ply)
OpenVDB (.vdb)
STL (.stl)
Wavefront (.obj)
Text (.txt)
Geometry Nodes Import Nodes
Simple UI. Infinite potential.
Drag & Drop
Import files by dragging and dropping them onto the Geometry Node Editor.

Smart Sequencing
When combined with the new Format String node, importing sequences is as flexible as it gets.

Geometry Nodes Import Sequence
Supports float, integer, and string inputs. Both unnamed and named.
THE NEW NORMAL

Custom mesh normals are now editable in Geometry Nodes with the new Set Mesh Normal node! Modify both “Tangent Space” normals and a new, faster “Free” format.

Grease Nodes
Grease Pencil creation with Geometry Nodes just got better, including added support for custom Node Tools.

Plus these new nodes:

Set Grease Pencil Color: Writes stroke/fill color and opacity.
Set Grease Pencil Depth: Controls the depth (rendering) option.
Set Grease Pencil Softness: Controls the “Softness” attribute.
Additionally, the Named Layer Selection node now supports search.

All these nodes are now organized inside a dedicated Grease Pencil sub-menu.

Grease Pencil nodes Blender 4.5 LTS
Grease Pencil Geometry Nodes in Blender 4.5 LTS. New nodes are highlighted.
Geometry Nodes tools panels
Node Tools now support panels.
Node Tools
Custom node tools are now easier to organize thanks to support for collapsible panels, including the use of boolean sockets as checkboxes in their headers, just like native built-in operators!

This is part of a refactor that allows the Adjust Last Operation panel to share the same code as modifiers, so future improvements will benefit both systems.

For example, you can now search for attributes within the Adjust Last Operation panel.

Geometry Node tools attribute search
All New Nodes
Blender 4.5 LTS brings a solid set of new Geometry Nodes focused on data access and string handling.

Meet these new nodes:

Camera Info
Instance Bounds
Match String
Bit Math
Field Average, Field Variance, and Field Min & Max
Plus the already mentioned Format String and Grease Pencil nodes.
All new Geometry Nodes in Blender 4.5 LTS
All new Geometry Nodes in Blender 4.5 LTS
What the community is creating with Geometry Nodes
ON PERFORMANCE
Vertex to Edge attribute domain interpolation 1.7x faster
Corner to Vertex attribute 1.4x faster
Face to Vertex domain interpolation up to 7x faster
Face Corner and Custom Normals twice as fast

What’s Next?
Get a glimpse of what’s to come to Geometry Nodes (spoiler alert: hair dynamics and physics!).

EVEN MORE GEOMETRY NODES
New Visual Geometry to Objects operator
Mesh to Curve new Face option
Named geometries in String to Curves
Bounding Box radius option
Better Image Node UI in modifiers
Curve to Mesh scale input
Viewer node shortcuts
Link-drag search supports adding zones
Better muted Switch nodes
Improved Menu Switch node
New Left/Right Handle defaults
Better default field inputs
Power and Sign support in Vector Math
Geometry Set Python API
EEVEE & VIEWPORT
Start Me Up, Fast
Blender 4.5 LTS is noticeably faster thanks to performance improvements such as faster texture loading, quicker startup times, and multi-threaded shader compilation by default on supported platforms.

A new user preference allows choosing between multi-threaded and subprocess compilation.

Blender 4.5 LTS
Blender 4.4
Startup Time
Texture Loading
0
1
2
3
4
5
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Lower is better
Unit: seconds
EEVEE
Hasta La Vista
A new shadow terminator bias has been introduced, helping eliminate self-shadowing artifacts on low-polygon geometry. This is a per-object setting to shift the shadowed position along the shading normal.

Sound familiar? Cycles introduced this feature in Blender 3.0, and it has now become a global setting shared by both engines.

MORE EEVEE & VIEWPORT
Reverse-Z: new algorithm to reduce depth buffer artifacts
Improved selection and navigation auto-depth
Shadow normal issues fixed
GPU based subdivision
Light leaking issues fixed
New profiling command line agrument
Still from Agent 327: view of Amsterdam.
INDUSTRY READY

All libraries used in Blender 4.5 LTS are aligned with the VFX Reference Platform 2025, making studio pipeline integration and maintenance easier.

COMPOSITOR
Go Procedural
All the procedural texture nodes you know and love from Shaders and Geometry Nodes, are now available in the Compositor.

Blender 4.5 LTS compositor meets procedural textures.
The usual suspects:

Brick: Highly customizable texture producing bricks.
Checker: Simple checkerboard texture.
Gabor: Noise visually characterized by random interleaved bands.
Gradient: Color band gradient.
Magic: Classic Blender’s magic sauce.
Noise: Fractal Perlin noise.
Voronoi: Worley noise.
Wave: Procedural bands or rings with noise distortion.
White Noise: Random number based noise.
Compositing Harmony
The Compositor is now more unified than ever.
Common nodes have been added and can be easily copied across Shader and Geometry Nodes setups.

The following common nodes are now available in the Compositor:

Vector Math
Vector Rotate
Mix Vector
Math
Clamp
Float Curve
Blackbody
Common nodes in Blender 4.5 LTS Compositor
Welcome these common nodes to the Compositor.
New nodes in Blender 4.5 LTS Compositor
New input and utility nodes.
Plus these brand new nodes:

Image Info: provides resolution, dimensions, and image transformations.
Relative to Pixel: converts values that are relative to the image size to be in pixels.
Image Coordinates: provides various types of pixel coordinates, including normalized and integer pixel coordinates.
MORE COMPOSITOR
Denoise node now supports GPU devices
Added support for boolean sockets
Box & Ellipse mask nodes gizmos
Viewer node added by default
New clamp input in Glare
Scale node interpolation
Corner Pin node interpolation
Split node gizmo
Image Editor render size overlay
Vector images consume less memory
Image node support vector outputs from EXR images
Mix Color clamp factor and result
Improved Map Range
Vector Curves new factor input
Removed or deprecated duplicate functionality
EXPAND
YOUR BLENDER

The Blender Extensions platform keeps growing, with 600 free add-ons and themes to customize your workflows.

You can also share your own add-ons and themes!

GREASE PENCIL
GLOW UP

This release is a big one for Grease Pencil. Featuring integration with the Compositor, introducing support for Geometry Nodes tools, missing features have been brought back, and strokes look better than ever.

Blender 4.5 LTS is the perfect match for your next 2D/3D animation project.

Pencil Perfect
A new render pass outputs the visible Grease Pencil strokes and fills into a separate layer.

This pass is useful for isolating, enhancing, or applying effects to Grease Pencil elements during compositing.

“Fix it in post” now applies to Grease Pencil too, for better or worse.
Grease Pencil render pass and filter in Blender 4.5 LTS
Grease Pencil pass and filter in Blender 4.5 LTS
Full Control
In addition to the render pass, Grease Pencil rendering can be completely disabled per View Layer using the Filter option, similar to Surfaces, Volumes, and other types.

LOOKING
SHARP

A new supersampling anti-aliasing (SSAA) method improves line quality for smoother lines.

SMAA (current)
SSAA (new)
SMAA + SSAA
SMAA (current)
The current subpixel morphological anti-aliasing (SMAA) method is still used for the viewport and final render but now can be controlled independently under Render properties, Grease Pencil panel. This example uses threshold 1.0.

MORE GREASE PENCIL
Support exporting animated SVGs
Support for Node Tools
No minimum thickness clamping
Filter modifiers by Layer Group
Geometry Nodes improvements
Improved Boundary Strokes, now Fill Guides
Show only active object onion skinning
Projects to Look forward to in 2024
PUT IT TO THE TEST
Share and compare your computer’s score with openly accessible benchmarks provided by the Blender community.

UV EDITING
UVs
Everywhere
All At Once
View UVs for the active or all selected objects, in any mode, at all times.

Previously limited to Edit Mode, UVs are now visible across all object modes in the Image Editor’s Mask and Paint views.

UVs visibility and opacity can be controlled through the Overlays popover.

GET THE ARTWORK
Blender splash artwork source files are available for you to play with, not only for Blender 4.5 LTS but for previous versions as well.

Blender 4.5 LTS splash artwork "DOGWALK" by Blender Studio
Blender 4.5 LTS splash artwork “DOGWALK” by Blender Studio
Make Your Point
Meet Point Cloud, a new object type for representing large numbers of individual points in 3D space. Ideal for visualizing 3D scan data, particle simulations, or sparse datasets.
Tokyo point cloud visualizat...

Photorealistic Rendering
Blender now features a powerful new unbiased rendering engine called Cycles that offers stunning ultra-realistic rendering.

The built-in Cycles rendering engine offers:

GPU & CPU rendering
Realtime viewport preview
HDR lighting support
Permissive License for linking with external software
Rendering in Blender with Cycles
Modeling in Blender
Fast Modeling
Blender’s comprehensive array of modeling tools make creating, transforming and editing your models a breeze.

Blender’s modeling tools include:

Keyboard shortcuts for a fast workflow
N-Gon support
Edge slide, collapse and dissolve
Grid and Bridge fill
Python scripting for custom tools and add-ons
Realistic Materials
With Blender’s new rendering engine the possibilities for materials are endless.

Key features are:

Complete Node Support for full customization
Physically accurate shaders like glass, translucency and SSS
Open Shading Language (OSL) support for coding unique shaders
Materials in Blender
Rigging in Blender
Fast Rigging
Transforming a model into a posable character has never been easier!

Blender offers an impressive set of rigging tools including:

Envelope, skeleton and automatic skinning
Easy weight painting
Mirror functionality
Bone layers and colored groups for organization
B-spline interpolated bones
Animation toolset
Whether it’s simple keyframing or complex walk-cycles, Blender allows artists to turn their still characters into impressive animations.

Blender’s animation feature set offers:

Automated walk-cycles along paths
Character animation pose editor
Non Linear Animation (NLA) for independent movements
IK forward/inverse kinematics for fast poses
Sound synchronization
rigging
Sculpting in Blender
Sculpting
Experience the joy of sculpting organic subjects using the built-in sculpting feature set of Blender.

Sculpting in Blender includes:

20 different brush types
Multi-res sculpting support
Dynamic Topology sculpting
Mirrored sculpting
Fast UV Unwrapping
Easily unwrap your mesh right inside Blender, and use image textures or paint your own directly onto the model.

Blender allows for:

Fast Cube, Cylinder, Sphere and Camera projections
Conformal and Angle Based unwrapping (with edge seams and vertex pinning)
Painting directly onto the mesh
Multiple UV layers
UV layout image exporting
UV Unwrapping in Blender
Compositing in Blender
Full Compositor
Blender comes with a fully fledged compositor built right in. That means no more exporting to third party programs, you can do it all without leaving the program.

The compositor comes with:

Impressive library of nodes for creating camera fx, color grading, vignettes and much more
Render-layer support
Full compositing with images and video files
Ability to render to multiLayer OpenEXR files
Multi-threaded
Amazing Simulations
Whether you need a crumbling building, rain, fire, smoke, fluid, cloth or full on destruction, Blender delivers great looking results.

Blender’s simulation tools include

Fluid – Realistic water and fluid simulations.
Smoke – Billowing smoke with flames and scene interaction.
Hair – Beautiful wafts of hair that blows in the wind and interacts with collisions.
Cloth – Amazingly realistic cloth simulations for clothing and environments
Rigid Body Physics – Makes any object destructable and collidable
Particles – For creating things like rain, sparks and shrapnel
463e785104
Blender Game Engine Screenshot
Game Creation
Included in Blender is a complete game engine, allowing you to create a fully featured 3d game right inside Blender.

The game engine includes:

Ability to port your models to any third-party game engine
Create or code your own game logic
Full Bullet Physics integration
Python scripting API for advanced control and AI
Support for all OpenGLTM dynamic lighting, toon shading, animated materials as well as Normal and Parallax Mapping
Playback of games inside Blender without compiling or preprocessing
3D spatial audio using OpenAL
Camera and Object tracking
Blender now includes production ready camera and object tracking. Allowing you to import raw footage, track the footage, mask areas and see the camera movements live in your 3d scene. Eliminating the need to switch between programs.

The Camera and Object Tracker includes:

Auto and manual tracking
Powerful camera reconstruction
Real-time preview of your tracked footage and 3d scene
Support for Planar tracking and Tripod solvers
Camera tracking in Blender
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Library of Extensions
With a large community of enthusiasts and developers, Blender comes loaded with a vast array of extensions that you can turn on or off easily.

Some existing extensions include:

Generators for trees, terrain, ivy and clouds.
Fracture Objects.
3D Printing Toolbox.
Rigify meta-rigging system.
Import and Export format support for AfterEffects, DirectX, Unreal Game Engine and more!
Plus many more that you can download here

Video Editing
Blender even comes with a built-in Video Editor.

The Video Editor allows you to perform basic actions like video cuts and splicing, as well as more complex tasks like video masking.

The Video Editor includes:

Live preview, luma waveform, chroma vectorscope and histogram displays
Audio mixing, syncing, scrubbing and waveform visualization
Up to 32 slots for adding video, images, audio, scenes, masks and effects
Speed control, adjustment layers, transitions, keyframes, filters and more.
caminandes_edit_final
Exporting in Blender
File Formats
Blender comes packed with import/export support for many different programs.

Including:

Image
JPEG, JPEG2000, PNG, TARGA, OpenEXR, DPX, Cineon, Radiance HDR, SGI Iris, TIFF
Video
AVI, MPEG and Quicktime (on OSX).
3D
Alembic, 3D Studio (3DS), COLLADA (DAE), Filmbox (FBX), Autodesk (DXF), Wavefront (OBJ), DirectX (x), Lightwave (LWO), Motion Capture (BVH), SVG, Stanford PLY, STL, VRML, VRML97, X3D.
Flexible Interface
Novice and advanced users will love the ability to customize their layout completely. From simply splitting their viewport, to fully customizing it with python scripting, blender works for you.

Blender’s interface also offers:

Consistency across all platforms
No disruptive pop-up windows
Crisp text (support for retina on OSX)