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Troubleshooting Performance

Here are some tips to help you uncover common performance problems

PlayCanvas and other WebGL applications run very slowly in Google Chrome​

Chrome contains a blacklist of GPUs (graphics processors) and graphics card drivers which it will block from running WebGL content. In these cases Chrome will revert to using a software renderer to render WebGL content. This will be significantly slower than using the GPU. It is possible that upgrading graphics card drivers will improve performance.

You can view the blacklisted cards here.

To confirm if you are running using the software renderer, visit WebGL Report. If Chrome is using the software renderer you will see the row for Unmasked Renderer reports SwiftShader.

PlayCanvas and other WebGL applications do not load in Firefox​

Firefox contains a blacklist of GPUs (graphics processors) and graphics card drivers which it will block from running WebGL content. In these cases Firefox not allow the application to create a WebGL context and the PlayCanvas application cannot start. It is possible that upgrading your graphics card drivers will enable the application to run.

You can view the blacklisted cards here.

PlayCanvas and other WebGL applications does not perform as well as expected on Windows with Nvidia graphics cards​

Many Windows PCs contain two graphics cards, an "Integrated" graphics card which is a lower powered GPU built onto the motherboard of the computer and an additional graphics card. Nvidia cards come with a control panel installed that lets the PC owner choose which graphics card is used to run which application. By default many PCs are set up to use the lower powered integrated graphics card to run web browsers like Google Chrome. In order to get the best performance out of WebGL applications it is important to ensure that the web browser is accelerated using the more powerful graphics card.