Real-Time Ray Tracing

Real-time ray tracing is a method of graphics rendering that simulates the physical behavior of light.

An image of an ancient building showing how real time light simulation works

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How Real Time Light Simulation Works

Real-time path tracing simulates the true physics of light, which uses ray tracing as one component of a larger light simulation system. This provides real-time experiences with true to life shadows, reflections and global illumination. Compared to rasterization, which is equivalent to casting one set of rays from a single point that stops at the first thing they hit, and ray tracing, which casts rays from many points in any direction, path tracing randomly samples all lights in a scene. Rays are traced over multiple bounces back to their light source, directly lighting objects or characters and indirectly lighting rooms or environments.

Explore Ray Tracing Tools and Technologies

RTX Kit

NVIDIA RTX™ Kit is a suite of technology to path trace game assets with AI, better organize geometry for improved path tracing performance, and create game characters with photorealistic visuals.

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DLSS

NVIDIA DLSS is a neural graphics technology that multiplies performance using AI to create entirely new frames, display higher resolution through image reconstruction, and improve the image quality of intensive ray-traced content.

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Omniverse

NVIDIA Omniverse™ is a platform of APIs, SDKs, and services that enable developers to easily integrate Universal Scene Description (OpenUSD) and NVIDIA RTX™ rendering technologies into existing software tools and simulation workflows for building AI systems.

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OptiX

NVIDIA OptiX™ is an application framework for achieving optimal ray-tracing performance on the GPU for non-realtime renderers. It provides a simple, recursive, and flexible pipeline for accelerating ray-tracing algorithms.

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Nsight Developer Tools

NVIDIA Nsight™ tools are a powerful set of libraries, SDKs, and developer tools spanning that enable developers to build, debug, profile, and develop software that utilizes path tracing.

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Real-Time Ray Tracing Learning Resources