Blender 5.1 Now Available
This release focuses on performance improvements, workflow updates across the core toolsets, and adds some new features like Raycast node.
After the major release of Blender 5.0, we've been tracking the development of Blender 5.1 since late 2025, and now it's finally available to everyone, featuring a Singularity splash screen. While this update does introduce some new features, its main focus is on quality-of-life improvements, stability, and overall polish.
For a full rundown of what's new, watch the video above by Jonathan Lampel, where he showcases updates in modeling, sculpting, Grease Pencil, and more. One major addition is the new Raycast node, which lets you cast rays against scene geometry.
It works similarly to the existing Geometry Nodes node but is now available for shaders in both Cycles and EEVEE. This opens up a lot of possibilities, including NPR-style effects integrated with scene shading. In EEVEE, though, it's currently limited to screen-space tracing. Here are a couple of demos from Cartesian Caramel and Late as usual:
Blender 5.1 also brings a significant boost to animation playback performance. Shape Key evaluation has improved greatly, particularly on high-poly meshes, and Actions are now much faster, too, especially for armatures with many keyed bones. Blender 5.1 adds the "Smooth (Gaussian)" F-curve modifier, which reduces noise and detail in a curve, similar to the Smooth operator, but in a non-destructive way.
You can now add node-based transition effects in Compositor with the new Sequencer Strip Info node, and the new Mask to SDF node allows you to convert any image or shape into signed distance fields.
Blender developers also focused on improving the codebase quality and overall stability through an initiative called the "Winter of Quality," during which over 350 reported issues were fixed. The Blender Extensions platform continues to expand, now offering over 900 free add-ons and themes to customize your workflow.
GPU rendering performance has been reportedly improved by up to 10% across various benchmark scenes, while CPU rendering on Windows is now up to 20% faster. Learn more about the changes in Blender 5.1 here and subscribe to our Newsletter, join our 80 Level Talent platform, follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, and Instagram, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.
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