The State of WebGPU

WebGPU shipped in Chrome 113 in May 2023, ending years of anticipation. Unlike WebGL, which was a thin wrapper over OpenGL ES 2.0, WebGPU is a modern GPU API designed from the ground up for the constraints of the web platform.

Why It Matters

WebGL's threading model meant that complex compute shaders had to live on the main thread, blocking UI rendering. WebGPU separates the compute and rendering pipelines and exposes GPU compute through a modern async API.

const adapter = await navigator.gpu.requestAdapter();
const device = await adapter.requestDevice();

const computePipeline = device.createComputePipeline({
  layout: 'auto',
  compute: {
    module: device.createShaderModule({ code: wgslCode }),
    entryPoint: 'main',
  },
});

Browser Support in 2023

• Chrome 113+ — stable, full support
• Edge 113+ — stable, mirrors Chrome
• Firefox — behind flag (dom.webgpu.enabled)
• Safari 18 — partial support, improving rapidly