# ROCm

> parallel computing platform and application programming interface

**Wikidata**: [Q110612569](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q110612569)  
**Wikipedia**: [English](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ROCm)  
**Source**: https://4ort.xyz/entity/rocm

## Summary
ROCm is AMD’s open-source parallel computing platform and application programming interface that lets developers tap Radeon GPUs for high-performance computing on Linux and Windows. Distributed under the MIT license, it provides compilers, libraries, and tools comparable to NVIDIA’s CUDA ecosystem.

## Key Facts
- Developed by AMD and first released in 2016; current stable lineage tracked up to 4.0.0 (Dec 2020).
- Licensed under MIT License; source code hosted at https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm.
- Runs on Linux and Microsoft Windows.
- Logo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/ROCm_logo.png.
- Official documentation hub: https://rocmdocs.amd.com/en/latest/index.html.
- Classified as free software, software stack, and application programming interface.
- Supports concurrent computing workloads.
- GitHub organization “ROCm” hosts all sub-projects.

## FAQs
### Q: What hardware does ROCm support?
A: ROCm is designed for AMD Radeon Instinct and select Radeon Pro GPUs; check the official compatibility list before installation.

### Q: Is ROCm only for Linux?
A: No; while early releases were Linux-only, current ROCm distributions also support Microsoft Windows.

### Q: How does ROCm compare to CUDA?
A: ROCm is AMD’s open-source analogue to NVIDIA CUDA, offering HIP (Heterogeneous-Compute Interface for Portability) to ease porting between the two stacks.

### Q: Is ROCm really free to use?
A: Yes—ROCm is released under the MIT License, allowing unrestricted commercial and academic use.

## Why It Matters
Before ROCm, developers who needed GPU acceleration were largely locked into NVIDIA’s proprietary CUDA ecosystem. ROCm broke that monopoly by providing an open, standards-based alternative optimized for AMD hardware. Because it is MIT-licensed, researchers, start-ups, and hyperscalers can modify and redistribute the stack without legal friction, fostering innovation in machine-learning frameworks such as TensorFlow and PyTorch. ROCm’s HIP layer even lets existing CUDA code run on AMD GPUs with minimal changes, slashing porting effort and hardware-vendor lock-in. For data centers already deploying EPYC CPUs and Radeon Instinct GPUs, ROCm unifies CPU and GPU programming under a single LLVM-based toolchain, simplifying maintenance and cutting licensing costs. The project’s open governance model encourages academic collaboration, resulting in peer-reviewed optimizations that feed back into the mainline code. In short, ROCm expands access to high-performance heterogeneous computing, drives competition, and accelerates scientific discovery.

## Notable For
- First major open-source alternative to CUDA for HPC-class GPU computing.
- MIT license grants full commercial redistribution rights—rare among GPU stacks.
- HIP portability layer allows many CUDA applications to compile for AMD GPUs unchanged.
- Unified Linux/Windows support distinguishes it from earlier AMD GPU compute efforts.
- Tight integration with the LLVM compiler project enables rapid support for new programming languages and standards.

## Body
### Origins and Governance
AMD announced ROCm in 2016 to create an open ecosystem around its new GCN and later CDNA architectures. By basing the stack on LLVM and HSA (Heterogeneous System Architecture), AMD aimed for vendor-neutral, standards-compliant tooling.

### Core Components
- **HIP**: C/C++ runtime that mirrors CUDA; source-portable across AMD and NVIDIA.
- **HCC**: C++ compiler that targets both CPU and GPU via LLVM.
- **MIOpen**: high-performance deep-learning primitives analogous to cuDNN.
- **rocBLAS/rocFFT/rocSPARSE**: GPU-tuned linear-algebra and signal-processing libraries.
- **ROCProfiler & ROCgdb**: profiling and debugging utilities.

### Release Cadence
Major point releases historically appeared every 1–3 months. Notable milestones include 2.7.2 (Sep 2019), 3.0 (Dec 2019), 3.5 (Jun 2020), and 4.0.0 (Dec 2020), each adding broader hardware support, library optimizations, and framework integrations.

### Operating System Support
Official binaries target select Linux distributions—RHEL, CentOS, Ubuntu, SLES—and Microsoft Windows 10/11. Gentoo Wiki hosts community install guides.

### Documentation and Community
AMD maintains comprehensive user and API docs at rocmdocs.amd.com. The GitHub issue tracker and AMD’s DevGurus forum serve as primary support channels.

## References

1. [Source](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/blob/develop/LICENSE)
2. [Release 2.7.2. 2019](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-2.7.2)
3. [Release 2.8. 2019](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-2.8)
4. [Release 2.10. 2019](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-2.10)
5. [Release 3.0. 2019](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-3.0)
6. [Release 3.1. 2020](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-3.1)
7. [Release 3.5. 2020](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-3.5)
8. [Release 3.5.1. 2020](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-3.5.1)
9. [Release 3.9.1. 2020](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-3.9.1)
10. [Release 3.10.0. 2020](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-3.10.0)
11. [Release 4.0.0. 2020](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-4.0.0)
12. [Release 4.0.1. 2021](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-4.0.1)
13. [Release 4.1.1. 2021](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-4.1.1)
14. [Release 4.3.1. 2021](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-4.3.1)
15. [Release 4.5.2. 2021](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-4.5.2)
16. [Release 5.0.1. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.0.1)
17. [Release 5.0.2. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.0.2)
18. [Release 5.1.1. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.1.1)
19. [Release 5.1.3. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.1.3)
20. [Release 5.2.1. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.2.1)
21. [Release 5.2.3. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.2.3)
22. [Release 5.3.2. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.3.2)
23. [Release 5.3.3. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.3.3)
24. [Release 5.4.1. 2022](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.4.1)
25. [Release 5.4.2. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.4.2)
26. [Release 5.4.3. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.4.3)
27. [Release 5.5. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/win-5.5)
28. [Release 5.5.0. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.5.0)
29. [Release 5.5.1. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.5.1)
30. [Release 5.6.0. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.6.0)
31. [Release 5.6.1. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.6.1)
32. [Release 5.7.0. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.7.0)
33. [Release 5.7.1. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-5.7.1)
34. [Release 6.0.0. 2023](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.0.0)
35. [Release 6.0.2. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.0.2)
36. [ROCm 6.1.0 Release. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.1.0)
37. [Release 6.1.1. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.1.1)
38. [Release 6.1.2. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.1.2)
39. [Release 6.2.0. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.2.0)
40. [ROCm 6.2.1 Release. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.2.1)
41. [ROCm 6.2.2 Release. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.2.2)
42. [ROCm 6.2.4 Release. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.2.4)
43. [ROCm 6.3.0 Release. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.3.0)
44. [ROCm 6.3.1 Release. 2024](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.3.1)
45. [Release 6.3.2. 2025](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.3.2)
46. [ROCm 6.3.3 Release. 2025](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.3.3)
47. [Release 6.4.0. 2025](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.4.0)
48. [Release 6.4.1. 2025](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.4.1)
49. [ROCm 6.4.2 Release. 2025](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.4.2)
50. [Release 6.4.3. 2025](https://github.com/ROCm/ROCm/releases/tag/rocm-6.4.3)