Vulkan Memory Allocator
Quick start

Project setup

Vulkan Memory Allocator comes in form of a "stb-style" single header file. You don't need to build it as a separate library project. You can add this file directly to your project and submit it to code repository next to your other source files.

"Single header" doesn't mean that everything is contained in C/C++ declarations, like it tends to be in case of inline functions or C++ templates. It means that implementation is bundled with interface in a single file and needs to be extracted using preprocessor macro. If you don't do it properly, you will get linker errors.

To do it properly:

  1. Include "vk_mem_alloc.h" file in each CPP file where you want to use the library. This includes declarations of all members of the library.
  2. In exacly one CPP file define following macro before this include. It enables also internal definitions.
#define VMA_IMPLEMENTATION
#include "vk_mem_alloc.h"

It may be a good idea to create dedicated CPP file just for this purpose.

Note on language: This library is written in C++, but has C-compatible interface. Thus you can include and use vk_mem_alloc.h in C or C++ code, but full implementation with VMA_IMPLEMENTATION macro must be compiled as C++, NOT as C.

Please note that this library includes header <vulkan/vulkan.h>, which in turn includes <windows.h> on Windows. If you need some specific macros defined before including these headers (like WIN32_LEAN_AND_MEAN or WINVER for Windows, VK_USE_PLATFORM_WIN32_KHR for Vulkan), you must define them before every #include of this library.

Initialization

At program startup:

  1. Initialize Vulkan to have VkPhysicalDevice, VkDevice and VkInstance object.
  2. Fill VmaAllocatorCreateInfo structure and create VmaAllocator object by calling vmaCreateAllocator().
VmaAllocatorCreateInfo allocatorInfo = {};
allocatorInfo.physicalDevice = physicalDevice;
allocatorInfo.device = device;
allocatorInfo.instance = instance;
VmaAllocator allocator;
vmaCreateAllocator(&allocatorInfo, &allocator);

Resource allocation

When you want to create a buffer or image:

  1. Fill VkBufferCreateInfo / VkImageCreateInfo structure.
  2. Fill VmaAllocationCreateInfo structure.
  3. Call vmaCreateBuffer() / vmaCreateImage() to get VkBuffer/VkImage with memory already allocated and bound to it.
VkBufferCreateInfo bufferInfo = { VK_STRUCTURE_TYPE_BUFFER_CREATE_INFO };
bufferInfo.size = 65536;
bufferInfo.usage = VK_BUFFER_USAGE_VERTEX_BUFFER_BIT | VK_BUFFER_USAGE_TRANSFER_DST_BIT;
VmaAllocationCreateInfo allocInfo = {};
VkBuffer buffer;
VmaAllocation allocation;
vmaCreateBuffer(allocator, &bufferInfo, &allocInfo, &buffer, &allocation, nullptr);

Don't forget to destroy your objects when no longer needed:

vmaDestroyBuffer(allocator, buffer, allocation);
VmaAllocatorCreateInfo::physicalDevice
VkPhysicalDevice physicalDevice
Vulkan physical device.
Definition: vk_mem_alloc.h:2377
VmaAllocator
Represents main object of this library initialized.
VmaAllocatorCreateInfo
Description of a Allocator to be created.
Definition: vk_mem_alloc.h:2372
VmaAllocation
Represents single memory allocation.
VMA_MEMORY_USAGE_GPU_ONLY
@ VMA_MEMORY_USAGE_GPU_ONLY
Definition: vk_mem_alloc.h:2680
vmaDestroyAllocator
void vmaDestroyAllocator(VmaAllocator allocator)
Destroys allocator object.
VmaAllocatorCreateInfo::device
VkDevice device
Vulkan device.
Definition: vk_mem_alloc.h:2380
VmaAllocationCreateInfo::usage
VmaMemoryUsage usage
Intended usage of memory.
Definition: vk_mem_alloc.h:2846
vmaCreateBuffer
VkResult vmaCreateBuffer(VmaAllocator allocator, const VkBufferCreateInfo *pBufferCreateInfo, const VmaAllocationCreateInfo *pAllocationCreateInfo, VkBuffer *pBuffer, VmaAllocation *pAllocation, VmaAllocationInfo *pAllocationInfo)
vmaCreateAllocator
VkResult vmaCreateAllocator(const VmaAllocatorCreateInfo *pCreateInfo, VmaAllocator *pAllocator)
Creates Allocator object.
VmaAllocatorCreateInfo::instance
VkInstance instance
Handle to Vulkan instance object.
Definition: vk_mem_alloc.h:2446
vmaDestroyBuffer
void vmaDestroyBuffer(VmaAllocator allocator, VkBuffer buffer, VmaAllocation allocation)
Destroys Vulkan buffer and frees allocated memory.
VmaAllocationCreateInfo
Definition: vk_mem_alloc.h:2838