Two days ago, on July 18, Intel released version 1.3.1 of the Intel XeSS SDK onto GitHub. This latest version of the Intel XeSS SDK only lists “Bug Fixes & Stability Improvements” verbatim, so we won’t get much meaningful information from analyzing the newest release by comparison. The XeSS SDK 1.3.0 release back on April 4 introduced new AI models, new Ultra and Native image quality presets, and increased resolution scale on every existing preset, as well.
Overall, Intel XeSS still looks relatively young compared to Nvidia’s DLSS or AMD’s FSR. While those solutions have both leveled up to offering Frame Generation alongside their image reconstruction functionality, Intel XeSS still provides no native Frame Generation capabilities. Instead, Intel XeSS users rely on games with Intel XeSS and AMD FSR 3 Frame Generation support, which can allow XeSS reconstruction with AMD’s open-sourced, cross-platform Frame Generation solution.
On the note of open source, don’t let the Intel XeSS SDK being available on GitHub fool you: XeSS still is not open source. The complete files needed to run Intel XeSS aren’t present on GitHub and are still being kept private by Intel well over a year into the XeSS release.
A silver lining to Intel XeSS compared to AMD FSR 3 is that Intel XeSS can, at least, leverage AI with its image-upscaling workloads. It seems to provide XeSS with slightly better image quality than AMD FSR and edges it closer to the upscaling market leader, Nvidia DLSS. However, if AMD FSR begins utilizing the onboard AI hardware of AMD GPUs, that gap could quickly be closed.
As a silver lining for Intel XeSS, its support across broader PC gaming is improving at a steady pace and seems to be standard with the newly common PlayStation-to-PC ports, among other AAA and AA titles. While only 105 games are highlighted by Intel on the official XeSS Enabled Games page, a SteamDB search now unveils that XeSS is present in 228 games on Steam—though this number also counts Demos and some Benchmarking software.
