Last Updated on June 3, 2025
OpenCL (Open Computing Language) is a framework for writing programs that execute across heterogeneous platforms consisting of central processing units (CPUs), graphics processing units (GPUs), digital signal processors (DSPs), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and other processors or hardware accelerators.
OpenCL greatly improves the speed and responsiveness of a wide spectrum of applications in numerous market categories including professional creative tools, scientific and medical software, vision processing, and neural network training and inferencing.
The framework defines a language to write “kernels” in. These kernels are the functions which are to run on the different compute devices.
OpenCL is an open standard maintained by the non-profit technology consortium Khronos Group.
1. Getting started with OpenCL and GPU Computing by Erik Smistad
This tutorial explains how to get started with OpenCL and how to make a small OpenCL program that will compute the sum of two lists in parallel.
2. Introductory Tutorial to OpenCL by Benedict R. Gaster
The following “Hello World” tutorial provides a simple introduction to OpenCL
3. OpenCL Tutorials by various authors
This is a collection of tutorials covering techniques to optimize FFT, an ntroduction to the OpenCL atomics functionality, non-uniform work-groups, and much more.
4. Getting started with OpenCL by Matthäus G. Chajdas
This is a short series on how to get started with OpenCL.
All tutorials in this series:
| Free Programming Tutorials | |
|---|---|
| ABAP | Advanced Business Application Programming |
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| F# | General purpose, strongly typed, multi-paradigm language. Part of ML |
| Factor | Dynamic stack-based language |
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| Fortran | The first high-level language, using the first compiler |
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| Hack | For the HipHop Virtual Machine (HHVM), created as a dialect of PHP |
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| LabVIEW | Designed to enable domain experts to build power systems quickly |
| LaTeX | Professional document preparation system and document markup language |
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| Limbo | Designed for applications running distributed systems on small computers |
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| MoonScript | Dynamic scripting programmer friendly language that compiles into Lua |
| Nim | Statically typed compiled systems language with syntax resembling Python |
| Objective-C | General purpose language which is a superset of C |
| OCaml | General-purpose, powerful, high-level language |
| Octave | High-level language, primarily intended for numerical computations |
| OpenCL | Open Computing Language |
| Pascal | Imperative and procedural language designed in the late 1960s |
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| Pike | Interpreted, general-purpose, high-level, cross-platform, dynamic language |
| PHP | PHP has been at the helm of the web for many years |
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| Python | General-purpose, structured, powerful language |
| QML | Hierarchical declarative language for user interface layout with a syntax to JSON |
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| Rust | Ideal for systems, embedded, and other performance critical code |
| Scala | Modern, object-functional, multi-paradigm, Java-based language |
| Scheme | General-purpose, functional, language descended from Lisp and Algol |
| Scratch | Visual programming language designed for 8-16 year-old children |
| Solidity | Object-oriented, high-level language for implementing smart contracts |
| SQL | Access and manipulate data held in a relational database management system |
| Standard ML | One of the two main dialects of the ML language |
| Swift | Powerful and intuitive general-purpose programming language |
| Tcl | Dynamic language based on concepts of Lisp, C, and Unix shells |
| TypeScript | Strict syntactical superset of JavaScript, adding optional static typing |
| V | Statically typed compiled language to build maintainable software |
| Vala | Object-oriented language with a self-hosting compiler that generates C code |
| VHDL | Very High Speed Integrated Circuit Hardware Description Language |
| VimL | Powerful scripting language of the Vim editor |
| XML | Set of rules for defining semantic tags that describe the structure and meaning |
| Zig | General-purpose programming language and toolchain |