Is Instanced StaticMesh useful for Mobile?

Development Asset Creation
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1

I test Instanced Staticmesh Component for Iphone6 Plus.

same map, same mesh

1 Actor with 900 Instance mesh : 60 drawcall.

900 StaticMeshActor No-Instance mesh : 900 over drawcall.

but No-instance mesh is beffer for frame rate. 40fps(instance mesh) vs 60fps(no instance mesh)

Is there any tested data for this? Should I do not use Instanced Staticmesh for mobile??

2

OpenGL ES2 does not support instancing so it is emulated. That happens here:

	static FORCEINLINE bool SupportsInstancing()						{ return false; }

So, although it reports 60 drawcalls, it is really 600. I do not believe there is any workaround or possible fix for ES2.

Let me know if you have more questions on this,

-Gil

3

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4

Thanks!!!

5

As a side note, on Metal iOS devices (iPhone 5s and newer) it will perform hardware instancing.

6

Top above Result,

I’ve tested on IPhone6 plus(maybe Metal is supported)
But instancing is slower than individual draw call.

in BaseEngine.ini,
bSupportsMetal=True

Instancing is fast for Metal?

7

Yes, on Metal it should be faster. I’ll loop in the iOS person to make sure it is going through the Metal RHI.

8

Yes, I agree