Back إس دي ال Arabic Simple DirectMedia Layer Catalan Simple DirectMedia Layer Czech Simple DirectMedia Layer German Simple DirectMedia Layer Spanish اس‌دی‌ال Persian Simple DirectMedia Layer Finnish Simple DirectMedia Layer French Simple DirectMedia Layer Hungarian SDL ID

Simple DirectMedia Layer

Simple DirectMedia Layer
Original author(s)Sam Lantinga
Developer(s)SDL Community
Initial release1998; 27 years ago (1998)
Stable release
3.2.2[1] Edit this on Wikidata / 2 February 2025
2.32.0 / 8 February 2025
Repository
Written inC
Operating systemVersion 3 supports same (current) platforms as version 2, such as 32- and 64-bit Windows 10+ and 64-bit macOS 10.7+ (support dropped for outdated e.g. Windows Phone/UWP[2]).[3]

Support for version 2: Linux (e.g. SteamOS), Windows, macOS 10.4+, iOS 3.1.3+, tvOS,[4] Android 2.3.3+, FreeBSD 8.4+, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 2, Haiku, RISC OS 3.5+,[5] MorphOS 0.4+[6][7]

Additionally before v2.0.0: e.g. AmigaOS and MorphOS, and consoles (PlayStation, XBox, Wii, etc), Nintendo DS
Platform'IA-32' (i386), 'x86-64', 'PowerPC', AArch64
TypeAPI
Licensezlib License
Before 2.0.0:
GNU LGPL[8]
Websitewww.libsdl.org

Simple DirectMedia Layer (SDL) is a cross-platform software development library designed to provide a hardware abstraction layer for computer multimedia hardware components. Software developers can use it to write high-performance computer games and other multimedia applications that can run on many operating systems such as Android, iOS, Linux, macOS, and Windows.[9]

SDL manages video, audio, input devices, threads, shared object loading, networking and timers.[10] For 3D graphics, it can handle an OpenGL, Vulkan,[11] Metal, or Direct3D11 (older Direct3D version 9 is also supported) context. A common misconception is that SDL is a game engine. However, the library is suited to building games directly, or is usable indirectly by engines built on top of it.

The library is internally written in C and possibly, depending on the target platform, C++ or Objective-C, and provides the application programming interface in C, with bindings to other languages available.[12] It is free and open-source software subject to the requirements of the zlib License since version 2.0, and with prior versions subject to the GNU Lesser General Public License.[8] Under the zlib License, SDL 2.0 is freely available for static linking in closed-source projects, unlike SDL 1.2,[13] although it is possible for the user to override the statically linked library with one provided by them.[14] SDL 2.0, released in 2013, was a major departure from previous versions, offering more opportunity for 3D hardware acceleration, but breaking backwards-compatibility, a wrapper library made to translate 1.2 calls to 2.0 was later made available.[15]

SDL is extensively used in the industry in both large and small projects. By 2010, over 700 games, 180 applications, and 120 demos had been posted on the library website.[16]

SDL supports Emscripten (i.e. programs that run on a web page).

SDL 3 was released, as a stable version, in January 2025. It has a migration guide, and Coccinelle tool support to help migrate to the new major version. SDL 3 has a new way to control the entry point of your program,[17] and you can optionally control execution in a non-framework way.

  1. ^ "Release 3.2.2". 2 February 2025. Retrieved 5 February 2025.
  2. ^ "winrt: Removed WinRT/Windows Phone/UWP support. by icculus · Pull Request #10731 · libsdl-org/SDL". GitHub. Retrieved 9 February 2025.
  3. ^ "SDL/docs/README-platforms.md at main · libsdl-org/SDL". GitHub. Retrieved 9 February 2025.
  4. ^ "Oh look, we'll have official tvOS support in SDL 2.0.5, for people that want their SDL-based games on Apple TV!". 15 September 2016.
  5. ^ "SDL/docs/README-riscos.md at 9d83c0a65d969a902c91f4f94fd5a904c0828a33 · libsdl-org/SDL". GitHub. Retrieved 17 March 2024.
  6. ^ "Great galaga style true color game for MorphOS (uses SDL)".
  7. ^ "SDL 2.30.7 Libraries". Retrieved 6 November 2024.
  8. ^ a b "SDL license". Retrieved 3 March 2014.
  9. ^ "a list of the platforms SDL supports". Libsdl.org. Archived from the original on 1 April 2016. Retrieved 9 April 2016.
  10. ^ "SDL official website". Libsdl.org. Retrieved 19 March 2010.
  11. ^ "CategoryVulkan - SDL Wiki'". wiki.libsdl.org. Retrieved 9 February 2025.
  12. ^ "SDL Language Bindings". libsdl.org. Simple DirectMedia Layer. Retrieved 13 August 2014.
  13. ^ "Licensing the Simple DirectMedia Layer library". Retrieved 30 January 2012.
  14. ^ "SDL/docs/README-dynapi.md at main · libsdl-org/SDL". GitHub. Retrieved 25 June 2024.
  15. ^ libsdl-org/sdl12-compat, Simple Directmedia Layer, 1 June 2024, retrieved 25 June 2024
  16. ^ "Simple DirectMedia Layer". 29 June 2010. Archived from the original on 29 June 2010. Retrieved 7 August 2021.
  17. ^ "SDL3/README/main-functions". wiki.libsdl.org. Retrieved 9 February 2025.
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