Which version of OpenGL should I learn? [duplicate]

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Which version of OpenGL to use?

I have been wanting to learn a 3d graphics language for some time now and I have finally decided to learn OpenGL. However, I work on a Mac and officially this highest version of OpenGL for mac is 2.1 but it can support 3.3 unofficially through tests that I have done.

I would like to develop applications that would work on multiple platforms but what version would be the best to learn?

Answer 1

A good compromise between portability and still learning the "modern OpenGL way", is roughly "the OpenGL ES 2.0 subset of OpenGL 2.1". That gives you portability to

• OSX, as you mention

• Windows, obviously

• Linux with open source drivers (for higher OpenGL versions and better performance you need the proprietary drives which you might prefer anyway, but some people like to avoid those)

• Smartphone platforms like iOS and Android.

OpenGL 1.x is even more portable (e.g. older iOS and Android releases support only OpenGL ES 1.x) but the classical fixed-function programming model is somewhat different than the modern one based on buffer objects and shaders, and use of immediate mode easily leads to performance issues when rendering lots of vertices. So probably not worth it, IMHO.