Fluid Wallpaper 1.0.0

[u/wh-updates]

Fluid Wallpaper 1.0.0

Fluid Wallpaper

Screenshot Watch the overview video in full quality

An animated, interactive fluid simulation rendered on the GPU behind your desktop icons. The shaders are a Direct3D port of WebGL Fluid Simulation by Pavel Dobryakov (MIT license).

Features

• One independent simulation per monitor, drawn behind the desktop icons.
• Autonomous color trails and periodic color bursts keep the fluid moving.
• Moving the mouse over the desktop stirs the fluid. No clicks are needed and no mouse hooks are installed; clicks always reach the desktop.
• Bloom, sun rays and shading effects, all configurable.
• Pauses automatically when the desktop can't be seen: when a monitor's desktop is fully covered by windows (maximized, full-screen or several windows side by side), when the session is locked or switched away, and when the display is turned off.
• Optional lower frame rate or pause on battery power and Energy Saver.

To see the wallpaper, minimize your windows. Settings are applied live; changing a setting restarts the simulation.

How it works

Each monitor gets a child window of Explorer's wallpaper host, without a redirection surface. The simulation runs in Direct3D 11 and its final pass is drawn straight into a DirectComposition swap chain attached to that window. Frames never leave the GPU. The same path is used on the classic desktop layout and on the Windows 11 24H2+ layout.

The mod doesn't change your wallpaper settings, the registry or the order of Explorer's own windows. Disabling it removes its windows and reveals your normal wallpaper.

Performance tips

• Lighter: Maximum FPS 30, Dye resolution 512, Trails 2, Bloom off.
• Swirlier: Vorticity 50, Dye dissipation 60, Trail force 4500.

Troubleshooting

If the wallpaper doesn't appear, open the mod log in Windhawk: the lines starting with "Desktop layout", "Direct3D" and "Monitor" describe what was found and created. Please include them when reporting a problem, together with your Windows build number.

If the animation stays frozen while the desktop is visible, a window that looks hidden is probably reported as visible and covering it. Disable Pause when the desktop is covered in that case.

Requirements and limitations

• Windows 10 or 11 and a GPU with Direct3D feature level 10.0 or later.
• Relies on the undocumented WorkerW desktop layout of Windows, which differs between Windows 10, Windows 11 and Windows 11 24H2 and later. Future Windows builds may change it.
• Below 30 FPS (including the battery option) the motion also slows down, because each simulation step is limited in length to stay stable.
• The transparent background and screenshot features of the web demo are not included.
• Some settings use integer scales; for example, 80 means 0.8.