DirectX Hardware Acceleration Inside

Faster... Much Faster (with superior HighDPI support for your next WinForms app)

We are proud to be the first UI Component vendor to offer DirectX rendering for a variety of WinForms UI controls.

DirectX was developed as an alternative to GDI+. DirectX addresses the demands of new computing paradigms and high-DPI 4K+ displays. With DirectX Hardware Acceleration, modern desktop apps can display higher pixel densities at a much faster rate and use less memory than GDI+.

Our major WinForms controls including our WinForms Data Grid, Charts, Pivot Grid, Diagram, and Scheduler are powered by our WinForms DirectX rendering engine. By moving from GDI/GDI+ to DirectX, we've improved both performance and rendering quality. DirectX has also allowed us to radically improve scrolling speed, zoom operational efficiency, text rendering/text antialiasing, and animation quality.

Natively on 4K/8K

The performance potential of a DirectX-powered WinForms UI component is most evident on high resolution displays. Even in simple scenarios - like scrolling through Data Grid records on a 4K display - GDI cannot properly manage volume and cannot maintain acceptable frame rates. In such scenarios, GDI generates unnecessary visual delays, whereas DirectX easily maintains 60+ FPS. With DirectX, UI controls remain fully responsive across a broad range of usage scenarios.

 

Performance Benchmark - DevExpress Grid with DirectX vs MS Data Grid

DevExpress WinForms Controls with DirectX Support

The following DevExpress WinForms UI controls support DirectX hardware acceleration. If you are new to DirectX or want to experience its potential, be sure to download our
free 30-day trial today.

  

Note: To ensure backward compatibility, the DevExpress WinForms UI Controls listed above support both DirectX and GDI/GDI+ rendering. You can specify the desired rendering engine as needed.

DirectX vs GDI - Strength in Numbers

To see DirectX in action and compare its performance and rendering capabilities to GDI, please review the following video. In it, we compare the DevExpress WinForms Data Grid (with DirectX Hardware Acceleration enabled) with Microsoft’s Standard GridView (like other data grids, Microsoft’s GridView uses GDI/GDI+). Note how quickly our DirectX-powered WinForms Data Grid is able to render information on screen versus the delays/lags of the standard GridView with GDI/GDI+.

 

DirectX – The Only Legitimate Path to Microsoft Fluent Design

Reveal Highlight & Acrylic Effects

Ready to incorporate acrylic effects, reveal highlighting, and adaptive designs in your WinForms software projects? The DevExpress WinForms UI libraries allow you to replicate Microsoft's Fluent Design UI metaphor and deliver stunning app-wide visual effects within your solution.

Our implementation of "Reveal Highlight" uses spot-specular lighting and color matrix effects and applies these to objects via an arithmetic composite. This requirement mandates use of a DirectX rendering engine and is impossible to achieve with a traditional GDI+ renderer. This – along with performance - is one of the reasons we chose to create our WinForms DirectX rendering engine.

 

Fluent Mail ClientWatch Video

* To execute the Fluent Mail Client demo, you must first install the DevExpress WinForms product library.

Fluent Mail Client App - DevExpress WinForms UI

Time to Rock & Roll – Download our Free Trial Today
And See Why our WinForms Controls Are Consistently Voted #1

Developers have consistently voted DevExpress best-in-class. Among countless other awards, we've received over 70 first place Visual Studio Magazine Reader's Choice awards over the last six years. Download our fully-functional 30-day trial today and experience the DevExpress difference today.

 

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Best in Class Tools

DevExpress is honored to have been voted best in class 19 times in this year's Visual Studio Magazine Reader's Choice Awards.

Experience the DevExpress difference and see why your peers consistently vote our products #1. With our Universal Subscription, you will build your best, see complex software with greater clarity, increase your productivity and create stunning applications for Windows, Web and your Mobile world.

19 VSM Awards in 2023 x19
20 VSM Awards in 2022 x20
20 VSM Awards in 2021 x20
18 VSM Awards in 2020 x18

Additional Info

WinForms UI Templates (EAP)

Jump start the form development process via polished and ready-to-use 'templates'. The motivation behind our WinForms UI Templates is to create ready-to-use UI solutions for real-life line-of-business (LOB) apps and eliminate the need for routine UI customizations. Read about UI Templates

Touch Enabled User Experience

Deliver elegant, touch-enabled WinForms applications using the platform you know and love. The WinForms Subscription helps you leverage your current investments and address customer needs via a comprehensive range of WinForms controls that support touch on Windows 8/10/11.

Sec 508 and Accessibility

The DevExpress WinForms Subscription makes it easy to create WinForms applications that meet government regulations regarding accessibility. Sec 508 and Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 support is available for DevExpress WinForms controls.

Straightforward Localization

All DevExpress WinForms controls can be localized using localization-related API or satellite resource assemblies. DevExpress delivers satellite assemblies for a large variety of languages and cultures. To help you get started, resource files for three cultures are included in our installation: German, Japanese, and Spanish. If you need to modify our shipping resources or create satellite assemblies for a different language, simply use our Online Localization Service or UI Localization Client tool.
Online Localization Service
UI Localization Client

Testing Support

The DevExpress Universal Subscription includes built-in support for Microsoft's CodedUI. Unlike many vendors claiming support for Coded UI through the simple use of MSAA, DevExpress controls go the extra mile to make certain that individual controls fully comply with Microsoft's testing framework. We don't simply support Coded UI; we support it to the maximum extent possible. Note: CodedUI support requires purchase of the DevExpress Universal Subscription. Learn more about Coded UI

MVVM Framework

The DevExpress MVVM Framework ships with features that are absent in WinForms, but essential to MVVM development. These missing features include bindings, commands, UI triggers, behaviors etc. Our Framework includes all of these along with a straightforward API to make WinForms app development more efficient. Learn more about MVVM Framework

Free 30-Day TrialSee What's New

190+ WinForms Controls


Our WinForms Subscription includes over 190 UI controls and libraries along with 60+ individual chart types. Here are some of the products included in this subscription:

 

Supported IDEs

Review the list of development tools and frameworks supported by our products. We strongly recommend that you always download and use the most recent versions. If the latest version does not support the IDE or framework you're using, please submit a support ticket via the DevExpress Support Center and request an evaluation version that suits your requirements.

Version
24.1.5
23.1.12
22.1.14
18.1.18
Release Date
15-August-2024
15-August-2024
7-May-2024
5-May-2022
Support Status
Supported
Limited Support
Not Supported
(for legacy apps)
Not Supported
(for legacy apps)
Minor Updates
Yes
No
No
No
Security Updates
Yes
Yes
No
No
Supported Frameworks
.NET 6 / .NET 7 / .NET 8
.NET Framework 4.5.2+
.NET 6 / .NET 7
.NET Framework 4.5.2+
.NET 5 / .NET 6
.NET Core 3.0+
.NET Framework 4.5.2+
.NET Framework 4.0+
Supported IDE
Visual Studio 2022
Visual Studio 2019
Visual Studio 2017
Visual Studio 2015
Visual Studio 2022
Visual Studio 2019
Visual Studio 2017
Visual Studio 2015
Visual Studio 2022
Visual Studio 2019
Visual Studio 2017
Visual Studio 2015
Visual Studio 2013
Visual Studio 2012
Visual Studio 2019
Visual Studio 2017
Visual Studio 2015
Visual Studio 2013
Visual Studio 2012
Visual Studio 2010