Proton is a

compatibility layer In software engineering, a compatibility layer is an interface that allows binaries for a legacy or foreign system to run on a host system. This translates system calls for the foreign system into native system calls for the host system. With som ...

for

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

games to run on

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

-based operating systems. Proton is developed by

Valve A valve is a device or natural object that regulates, directs or controls the flow of a fluid (gases, liquids, fluidized solids, or slurries) by opening, closing, or partially obstructing various passageways. Valves are technically fittings ...

in cooperation with developers from

CodeWeavers CodeWeavers is a company that sells a proprietary version of Wine called CrossOver for running Windows applications on macOS, ChromeOS and Linux. The company was founded in 1996 as a consultancy, eventually moving entirely over to Wine developmen ...

. It is a collection of software and libraries combined with a patched version of

Wine Wine is an alcoholic drink typically made from fermented grapes. Yeast consumes the sugar in the grapes and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Different varieties of grapes and strains of yeasts are m ...

to improve performance and compatibility with Windows games. Proton is designed for integration into the

Steam Steam is a substance containing water in the gas phase, and sometimes also an aerosol of liquid water droplets, or air. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization ...

client as "Steam Play". It is officially distributed through the client, although third party

forks In cutlery or kitchenware, a fork (from la, furca 'pitchfork') is a utensil, now usually made of metal, whose long handle terminates in a head that branches into several narrow and often slightly curved tines with which one can spear foods ei ...

can be manually installed.

Overview

Proton was initially released on 21 August 2018. Upon release, Valve announced a whitelist of 27 games that were tested and certified to perform like their native Windows counterparts without requiring end-user tweaking. These include ''Doom'' (2016), '' Quake'', and '' Final Fantasy VI''. Proton incorporates several libraries that improve 3D performance. These include

Direct3D Direct3D is a graphics application programming interface (API) for Microsoft Windows. Part of DirectX, Direct3D is used to render three-dimensional graphics in applications where performance is important, such as games. Direct3D uses hardware a ...

-to- Vulkan translation layers, namely DXVK for Direct3D 9, 10 and 11, and VKD3D-Proton for Direct3D 12. A separate library known as D9VK handled Direct3D 9 support until it was merged into DXVK in December 2019.

Compatibility

Being a fork of Wine, Proton maintains very similar compatibility with Windows applications as its upstream counterpart. In addition to the official whitelist, many other Windows games are reportedly compatible, albeit unofficially, with Proton. The user can optionally force use of Proton for a specific title, even if a Linux version already exists.

ProtonDB

ProtonDB is an unofficial community website that collects and displays crowdsourced data describing the compatibility of a given title with Proton, on a rating scale from "

Borked Robert Heron Bork (March 1, 1927 – December 19, 2012) was an American jurist who served as the solicitor general of the United States from 1973 to 1977. A professor at Yale Law School by occupation, he later served as a judge on the U.S. Court ...

" to "Platinum". The site is inspired by the WineHQ AppDB, which also collects and displays crowdsourced compatibility reports and uses a similar rating system.

Release history

Valve has released seven major versions of Proton. The versioning scheme refers to the upstream Wine version it's based on, with an appended patch number. Proton generally lags behind its upstream Wine base by several releases. Unofficial forks, such as Proton GE, have been created to re-base Proton on recent Wine versions, which may improve compatibility with games over the official release, and sometimes hurt it. In December 2020, Valve released Proton Experimental, a perpetual beta branch of Proton that incorporates new features and bug fixes quicker than regular releases, which are eventually included in a regular release. The Steam Deck uses Proton to increase software title compatibility.

References

External links