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WinUI 3 and the Windows App SDK are new technologies and, when compared to UWP, there are some features that aren't supported. This topic provides information on which features are supported before you attempt migration.
| UWP feature | WinUI 3 status |
|---|---|
| Background acrylic | ✅ Available via DesktopAcrylicController |
| Common UI controls | ✅ Supported |
| Composition/DirectX interop | ✅ Mostly supported; most Composition features and most Drawing features are available. But using global composition effects isn't supported in 1.5 |
| Distributing via Store | ✅ Supported |
| Live Tiles (on Windows 10) | ✅ Supported |
| MapControl | ✅ Supported; see MapControl (introduced in 1.5) |
| MediaElement and MediaPlayerElement | ✅ Use MediaPlayerElement, which was introduced in 1.2 |
| MSAL library | ✅ Supported |
| MSIX | ✅ Supported |
| Single-instancing | ✅ Supported |
| TaskbarManager API | ✅ Supported; for details, see TaskbarManager desktop samples |
| Toast notifications | ✅ Supported |
| Visual Studio App Center | ✅ Supported |
| Background tasks | ✅ Supported for C++ ⚠️ Partially supported for C# (OOP background tasks supported) |
| Best launch speed and performance | ⚠️ Slight disadvantage, see performance considerations |
| CoreTextServicesManager | ⚠️ Supported only on Windows 11 |
| PrintManager | ⚠️ Supported on Windows 11 (not yet available on Windows 10) |
| CameraCaptureUI | ❌ Not supported in 1.5. For alternative APIs, see Using video capture |
| CoreWindow and related APIs | ❌ Not supported in 1.5. For alternative APIs with some of the same functionality, see AppWindow, and HWND-based APIs |
| Full containerization of your app | ❌ Not supported in 1.5 |
| InkCanvas | ❌ Not supported in 1.5 |
| Single-app kiosk | ❌ Not supported in 1.5 |
| WebAuthenticationBroker | ❌ Not supported in 1.5; but see the IWebAuthenticationCoreManagerInterop interface |
| Xbox and HoloLens support | ❌ Not supported in 1.5 |
Performance considerations
Today in version 1.5 of the Windows App SDK, launch speeds, RAM usage, and installation size of WinUI 3 apps are larger/slower than seen in UWP. We're actively working to improve this.
Visual Studio
The Design tab of the XAML Designer in Visual Studio (and Blend for Visual Studio) doesn't currently support WinUI 3 projects (as of version 1.5 of the Windows App SDK). For more info, see Create a UI by using XAML Designer.
