Blender 5.0 Launches with Professional HDR Support

Blender 5.0 was officially released on November 18, 2025, marking a significant milestone for the open-source 3D graphics software with professional-grade enhancements focused on production workflows.

Blender 5, officially released

Professional Color Management and HDR Display

The standout feature is native HDR and wide gamut color support, which requires a compatible monitor and works on Linux systems using Wayland with the Vulkan backend.

The release introduces full support for ACES 1.3 and ACES 2.0, offering modernized scene-referred color space handling that brings Blender in line with industry-standard color pipelines used in film and VFX production.

Artists can now work with new Rec.2100-PQ and Rec.2100-HLG displays for HDR video color grading, alongside improved AgX HDR views as alternatives to the legacy Filmic color system.

Massive Geometry Support and Performance Improvements

For artists working with complex models, the .blend file format now supports larger buffers, enabling work with meshes containing hundreds of millions of vertices - a game-changer for high-resolution 3D scanning and detailed architectural visualization.

This addresses one of the most frustrating limitations for professionals importing massive geometry sets or working with dense simulations.

UI Refinements and Creative Workflow Enhancements

The user interface receives substantial refinement with over 300 theme settings removed and unified for easier custom theme creation.

A new Storyboarding template and workspace joins the lineup, while the Compositor gains Asset Shelf access for faster node group reuse.

Geometry Nodes expands with bundles, closures, and new procedural modeling capabilities, while Grease Pencil artists gain motion blur support for more cinematic 2D/3D hybrid animation.

This major version removes legacy support including Intel Macs (Apple Silicon now required), big-endian platforms, and pre-2.50 animation data. Studios should test add-on compatibility before deploying to production environments.