shadPS4/documents/building-windows.md

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SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2025 shadPS4 Emulator Project
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# Build shadPS4 for Windows

This tutorial reads as if you have none of the prerequisites already installed. If you do, just ignore the steps regarding installation.
> [!WARNING]
> If you are trying to compile older builds for testing, do not provide the `--depth 1` flag in `git clone`.
> This flag omits the commit history from your clone, saving storage space while preventing you from testing older commits.

Note: **ARM64 is not supported!** As of writing, it will not build nor run. The instructions with respect to ARM64 are for developers only.

## Option 1: Visual Studio 2022

### (Prerequisite) Download the Community edition from [**Visual Studio 2022**](https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/)

Once you are within the installer:

1. Select `Desktop development with C++`
2. Go to "Individual Components" tab then search and select both `C++ Clang Compiler for Windows` and `MSBuild support for LLVM`
3. Continue the installation

### (Prerequisite) Download [**Git for Windows**](https://git-scm.com/download/win)

Go through the Git for Windows installation as normal

### Cloning the source code

1. Open Git for Windows, navigate to a place where you want to store the shadPS4 source code folder
2. Clone the repository by running  
    `git clone --depth 1 --recursive https://github.com/shadps4-emu/shadPS4`

### Compiling with Visual Studio GUI

1. Open up Visual Studio, select `Open a local folder` and select the folder with the shadPS4 source code. The folder should contain `CMakeLists.txt`
2. Change Clang x64 Debug to Clang x64 Release if you want a regular, non-debug build.
3. If you want to build shadPS4 with the Qt Gui, simply select Clang x64 Release with Qt instead.
4. Change the project to build to shadps4.exe
5. Build -> Build All

Your shadps4.exe will be in `C:\path\to\source\Build\x64-Clang-Release\`

To automatically populate the necessary files to run shadPS4.exe, run in a command prompt or terminal:  
`C:\Qt\<QtVersion>\msvc2022_64\bin\windeployqt6.exe "C:\path\to\shadps4.exe"`  
(Change Qt path if you've installed it to non-default path)

## Option 2: MSYS2/MinGW

> [!IMPORTANT]
> Building with MSYS2 is broken as of right now, the only way to build on Windows is to use [Option 1: Visual Studio 2022](https://github.com/shadps4-emu/shadPS4/blob/main/documents/building-windows.md#option-1-visual-studio-2022).

### (Prerequisite) Download [**MSYS2**](https://www.msys2.org/)

Go through the MSYS2 installation as normal

If you are building to distribute, please omit `-DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="-O2 -march=native"` within the build configuration step.

Normal x86-based computers, follow:

1. Open "MSYS2 MINGW64" from your new applications
2. Run `pacman -Syu`, let it complete;
3. Run `pacman -S --needed git mingw-w64-x86_64-binutils mingw-w64-x86_64-clang mingw-w64-x86_64-cmake mingw-w64-x86_64-rapidjson mingw-w64-x86_64-ninja mingw-w64-x86_64-ffmpeg`
4. Run `git clone --depth 1 --recursive https://github.com/shadps4-emu/shadPS4`
5. Run `cd shadPS4`
6. Run `cmake -S . -B build -DCMAKE_C_COMPILER="clang.exe" -DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER="clang++.exe" -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="-O2 -march=native"`
7. Run `cmake --build build`
8. To run the finished product, run `./build/shadPS4.exe`

ARM64-based computers, follow:

1. Open "MSYS2 CLANGARM64" from your new applications
2. Run `pacman -Syu`, let it complete;
3. Run `pacman -S --needed git mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-binutils mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-clang mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-rapidjson mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-cmake mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-ninja mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-ffmpeg`
   1. Optional (Qt only): run `pacman -S --needed mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-qt6-base mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-qt6-tools mingw-w64-clang-aarch64-qt6-multimedia`
4. Run `git clone --depth 1 --recursive https://github.com/shadps4-emu/shadPS4`
5. Run `cd shadPS4`
6. Run `cmake -S . -B build -DCMAKE_C_COMPILER="clang.exe" -DCMAKE_CXX_COMPILER="clang++.exe" -DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="-O2 -march=native"`
7. Run `cmake --build build`
8. To run the finished product, run `./build/shadPS4.exe`

## Note on MSYS2 builds

These builds may not be easily copyable to people who do not also have a MSYS2 installation.
If you want to distribute these builds, you need to copy over the correct DLLs into a distribution folder.
In order to run them, you must be within the MSYS2 shell environment.