VK_KHR_dedicated_allocation(3)

# VK_KHR_dedicated_allocation(3) Manual Page

## Name

VK_KHR_dedicated_allocation - device extension

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## Registered Extension Number

128

## Revision

3

## Ratification Status

Ratified

## Extension and Version Dependencies

VK_KHR_get_memory_requirements2
or
Vulkan Version 1.1

## Deprecation State

- Promoted to Vulkan 1.1

## Contact

- James Jones [GitHub]cubanismo

## Other Extension Metadata

Last Modified Date

  2017-09-05

IP Status

  No known IP claims.

Contributors

  - Jeff Bolz, NVIDIA

  - Faith Ekstrand, Intel

## Description

This extension enables resources to be bound to a dedicated allocation, rather than suballocated. For any particular resource, applications can query whether a dedicated allocation is recommended, in which case using a dedicated allocation may improve the performance of access to that resource. Normal device memory allocations must support multiple resources per allocation, memory aliasing and sparse binding, which could interfere with some optimizations. Applications should query the implementation for when a dedicated allocation may be beneficial by adding a `VkMemoryDedicatedRequirementsKHR` structure to the `pNext` chain of the `VkMemoryRequirements2` structure passed as the `pMemoryRequirements` parameter of a call to `vkGetBufferMemoryRequirements2` or `vkGetImageMemoryRequirements2`. Certain external handle types and external images or buffers may also depend on dedicated allocations on implementations that associate image or buffer metadata with OS-level memory objects.

This extension adds a two small structures to memory requirements querying and memory allocation: a new structure that flags whether an image/buffer should have a dedicated allocation, and a structure indicating the image or buffer that an allocation will be bound to.

## Promotion to Vulkan 1.1

All functionality in this extension is included in core Vulkan 1.1, with the KHR suffix omitted. The original type, enum, and command names are still available as aliases of the core functionality.

## New Structures

- Extending VkMemoryAllocateInfo:

  - VkMemoryDedicatedAllocateInfoKHR

- Extending VkMemoryRequirements2:

  - VkMemoryDedicatedRequirementsKHR

## New Enum Constants

- `VK_KHR_DEDICATED_ALLOCATION_EXTENSION_NAME`

- `VK_KHR_DEDICATED_ALLOCATION_SPEC_VERSION`

- Extending VkStructureType:

  - VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_MEMORY_DEDICATED_ALLOCATE_INFO_KHR

  - VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_MEMORY_DEDICATED_REQUIREMENTS_KHR

## Examples

        // Create an image with a dedicated allocation based on the
        // implementation's preference

        VkImageCreateInfo imageCreateInfo =
        {
            // Image creation parameters
        };

        VkImage image;
        VkResult result = vkCreateImage(
            device,
            &imageCreateInfo,
            NULL,               // pAllocator
            &image);

        VkMemoryDedicatedRequirementsKHR dedicatedRequirements =
        {
            .sType = VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_MEMORY_DEDICATED_REQUIREMENTS_KHR,
            .pNext = NULL,
        };

        VkMemoryRequirements2 memoryRequirements =
        {
            .sType = VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_MEMORY_REQUIREMENTS_2,
            .pNext = &dedicatedRequirements,
        };

        const VkImageMemoryRequirementsInfo2 imageRequirementsInfo =
        {
            .sType = VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_IMAGE_MEMORY_REQUIREMENTS_INFO_2,
            .pNext = NULL,
            .image = image
        };

        vkGetImageMemoryRequirements2(
            device,
            &imageRequirementsInfo,
            &memoryRequirements);

        if (dedicatedRequirements.prefersDedicatedAllocation) {
            // Allocate memory with VkMemoryDedicatedAllocateInfoKHR::image
            // pointing to the image we are allocating the memory for

            VkMemoryDedicatedAllocateInfoKHR dedicatedInfo =
            {
                .sType = VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_MEMORY_DEDICATED_ALLOCATE_INFO_KHR,
                .pNext = NULL,
                .image = image,
                .buffer = VK_NULL_HANDLE,
            };

            VkMemoryAllocateInfo memoryAllocateInfo =
            {
                .sType = VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_MEMORY_ALLOCATE_INFO,
                .pNext = &dedicatedInfo,
                .allocationSize = memoryRequirements.size,
                .memoryTypeIndex = FindMemoryTypeIndex(memoryRequirements.memoryTypeBits),
            };

            VkDeviceMemory memory;
            vkAllocateMemory(
                device,
                &memoryAllocateInfo,
                NULL,               // pAllocator
                &memory);

            // Bind the image to the memory

            vkBindImageMemory(
                device,
                image,
                memory,
                0);
        } else {
            // Take the normal memory sub-allocation path
        }

## Version History

- Revision 1, 2017-02-27 (James Jones)

  - Copy content from VK_NV_dedicated_allocation

  - Add some references to external object interactions to the overview.

- Revision 2, 2017-03-27 (Faith Ekstrand)

  - Rework the extension to be query-based

- Revision 3, 2017-07-31 (Faith Ekstrand)

  - Clarify that memory objects allocated with VkMemoryDedicatedAllocateInfoKHR can only have the specified resource bound and no others.

## See Also

No cross-references are available

## Document Notes

For more information, see the Vulkan Specification.

This page is a generated document. Fixes and changes should be made to the generator scripts, not directly.

## Copyright

Copyright 2014-2026 The Khronos Group Inc.

SPDX-License-Identifier: CC-BY-4.0