Blender

Blender 5.0 shipped on November 18, 2025, bringing full ACES pipeline support, stronger HDR color management, new modeling modifiers, and the Storyboarding template. Blender 4.5 LTS also delivered Vulkan support, Grease Pencil compositor integration, and Geometry Nodes import improvements for long-running production work.

• Blender 5.0: Added the Array and Scatter on Surface modifiers, the Storyboarding template, and Volumes and SDF nodes for Geometry Nodes. The release also included animation and rigging improvements, reworked UV Sync, and 588 bug fixes.
• Blender 4.5 LTS: Added the Grease Pencil Pass in the Compositor, multiple-format importing in Geometry Nodes, UV visibility in all modes, and a faster Video Sequencer with HDR support. Full Vulkan support, faster EEVEE shader compilation, and nearly 500 bug fixes strengthened the LTS release.
• Grease Pencil and Geometry Nodes: The Grease Pencil Fill workflow gained support for holes, while Geometry Nodes expanded its volume and string-handling capabilities. Shading also gained the Raycast node, which supported more non-photorealistic rendering workflows.
• Production and platform updates: Rendering, animation, and viewport performance improved, while VFX Platform 2026 alignment brought updated libraries including Python 3.13. Blender 5.1.0 addressed 71 issues, including problems in Line Art, Vulkan compositing, Grease Pencil, and animation systems.

Blender 3.0 launched on December 3, 2021, marking a major new era for open-source 2D and 3D content creation. It followed Blender 2.93 LTS, which expanded Geometry Nodes and Grease Pencil, while Blender 3.1 later added more procedural modeling and animation tools.

• Release milestones: Blender 2.93 LTS delivered the long-term-support release, while Blender 3.0 established the next major version line for the application.

• Geometry Nodes: Procedural modeling received some of the period’s deepest changes.

  • Blender 2.93 LTS: Expanded Geometry Nodes with texture sampling, volume-data support, proximity tools, and new nodes for removing, converting, clamping, and generating primitives.
  • Blender 3.1: Added further procedural-modeling nodes and improved Geometry Nodes multithreading and memory usage.
  • Spreadsheet Editor: Gained improvements for inspecting Geometry Nodes data.

• Grease Pencil and animation: Grease Pencil gained SVG and PDF export, faster multi-frame filling, and the Line Art Modifier for stylized line creation. Blender 3.1 also added new Graph Editor animation tools and further Grease Pencil updates.

• Rendering and hardware: Metal GPU backend support arrived for M1 processors and AMD graphics cards. Cycles became faster with improved handling of blurry normals, while EEVEE received rewritten depth-of-field rendering plus improved ambient occlusion and volumetrics.

• Video and interchange: The Video Sequencer Editor received enhancements and automatic proxy generation, while the Blender 3.1 OBJ exporter was marked experimental after material-grouping, scaling, and modifier-control issues. The old Python OBJ Exporter menu item returned in April 2022.

Blender 2.90 Official Release expanded EEVEE, Cycles, sculpting, VR, animation, modeling, and UV editing while integrating major rendering libraries. Geometry Nodes introduced a new node-based modifier system, while Blender 2.83 established VR support and other foundational tools.

• Blender 2.90: The release improved EEVEE, Cycles, sculpting, animation, modeling, and UV editing, and integrated Intel Embree, Intel OpenImageDenoise, and NVIDIA OptiX for rendering. SteamVR support also reached Linux, albeit with limitations.
• Blender 2.83: Added Virtual Reality Support, OpenVDB Import, the physics-enabled Cloth Brush, and OptiX Viewport Denoising. Blender 2.83 also included more than 1,250 bug fixes, while Blender 2.83.1, Blender 2.83.2, and Blender 2.83.3 LTS added 33, 15, and 17 further fixes.
• New creative tools:
  • Geometry Nodes introduced a custom modifier for manipulating geometry through nodes, initially focused on point scattering.
  • Grease Pencil gained Bézier-curve editing for strokes.
  • Video Sequence Editor received improvements aimed at professional editing workflows.
  • Sculpting Workspace added Grab Silhouette and Multires Displacement Smear.
  • Add Primitive Tool enabled interactive primitive creation with a few clicks.
• Cycles and GPU support: CUDA 11 builds arrived for Cycles, while OptiX expanded to Maxwell-generation GPUs and gained precompiled PTX kernels for older hardware. A high-quality normals workaround also improved viewport drawing on AMD Polaris GPUs.

Blender 2.80 officially became available on July 30, 2019, marking the window’s biggest release and a major foundation for the 2.8 series. Later additions brought MantaFlow fluid and smoke simulation, alongside UDIM and USD support for more advanced production workflows.

• Blender 2.80: The official release delivered the finished 2.80 feature set after the release-candidate phase, establishing the 2.8 series as the main platform for subsequent additions.
• Rendering and asset pipelines: Several important production features arrived:
  • AI Denoising improved rendered-image quality.
  • Intel Open Image Denoising integrated Intel’s denoising technology.
  • NVIDIA RTX ray tracing added RTX acceleration support to Cycles.
  • UDIM and USD support expanded Blender’s texturing and asset-exchange capabilities.
• Simulation and creative tools: Core authoring systems received substantial upgrades:
  • MantaFlow introduced new fluid and smoke simulation features.
  • Sculpting Tools Overhaul significantly improved Blender’s sculpting workflow.
  • Grease Pencil Improvements enhanced Blender’s 2D drawing and animation toolset.
• Workflow: The New File Browser made file navigation easier, while the Improved Outliner enhanced scene organization and usability.

Tracked sources for Blender were limited between 2018-04-24 and 2019-04-24, with only 1 verified change captured in this window. The recorded activity centers on Blender 2.80 Beta Released and sits between Blender 2.79a Maintenance Release on 2018-02-28 (bug_fix) and Blender 2.80 Release Candidate Available on 2019-07-12 (new_content), making this a light but still readable period in the game's history.

• Verified activity: 2018-11-29 - Blender 2.80 Beta Released: The first beta version of Blender 2.80 has been released, marking a significant milestone in development..
• What stands out: The period is defined more by a small number of isolated updates than by a large roadmap beat or expansion-sized release.
• Before this window: The closest earlier tracked activity was Blender 2.79a Maintenance Release on 2018-02-28 (bug_fix).
• After this window: The next tracked activity was Blender 2.80 Release Candidate Available on 2019-07-12 (new_content).

Blender 2.79 delivered a substantial rendering upgrade, adding Principled BSDF, Shadow Catcher, Filmic Color Management, and denoising. It also improved Alembic I/O, expanded animation tools, and made AMD OpenCL performance up to five times faster.

• Rendering and shading: Blender 2.79 added several major production features:
  • Principled BSDF introduced Disney-inspired physically based shading.
  • Shadow Catcher supported compositing rendered shadows onto live-action footage.
  • Filmic Color Management improved the handling and display of high-dynamic-range renders.
  • Denoising reduced noise in rendered images.
• Animation and pipeline tools: Alembic I/O improved for asset exchange, while the Pose Library received enhancements for animation workflows.
• Stability and performance: Blender 2.79a shipped as a maintenance release with more than 200 fixes, while the broader Blender 2.79 release cycle addressed more than 700 bugs. OpenCL performance also improved by up to five times on AMD cards.

Pixar’s OpenSubdiv support arrived in Blender on October 12, 2015, adding the geometry subdivision technology to its modeling toolkit. The same release added text effect strips to the Sequencer and delivered a significant viewport performance boost.

• Pixar’s OpenSubdiv: Blender gained initial support for OpenSubdiv geometry subdivision technology.
• Sequencer text effect strips: The Sequencer added text effect strips with subtitle export support.
• Sculpting with tiled strokes: Sculpting gained tiled-stroke support, while absolute grid snapping arrived in the 3D View. The release also added node auto-offset, improved viewport and File Browser performance, and enabled arrow-key navigation in the File Browser.