# VkDescriptorPoolCreateFlagBits(3) Manual Page

## Name

VkDescriptorPoolCreateFlagBits - Bitmask specifying certain supported operations on a descriptor pool

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## C Specification

Bits which can be set in VkDescriptorPoolCreateInfo::`flags`, enabling operations on a descriptor pool, are:

    // Provided by VK_VERSION_1_0
    typedef enum VkDescriptorPoolCreateFlagBits {
        VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_FREE_DESCRIPTOR_SET_BIT = 0x00000001,
      // Provided by VK_VERSION_1_2
        VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_UPDATE_AFTER_BIND_BIT = 0x00000002,
      // Provided by VK_EXT_mutable_descriptor_type
        VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_HOST_ONLY_BIT_EXT = 0x00000004,
      // Provided by VK_NV_descriptor_pool_overallocation
        VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_ALLOW_OVERALLOCATION_SETS_BIT_NV = 0x00000008,
      // Provided by VK_NV_descriptor_pool_overallocation
        VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_ALLOW_OVERALLOCATION_POOLS_BIT_NV = 0x00000010,
      // Provided by VK_EXT_descriptor_indexing
        VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_UPDATE_AFTER_BIND_BIT_EXT = VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_UPDATE_AFTER_BIND_BIT,
      // Provided by VK_VALVE_mutable_descriptor_type
        VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_HOST_ONLY_BIT_VALVE = VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_HOST_ONLY_BIT_EXT,
    } VkDescriptorPoolCreateFlagBits;

## Description

- `VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_FREE_DESCRIPTOR_SET_BIT` specifies that descriptor sets can return their individual allocations to the pool, i.e. all of vkAllocateDescriptorSets, vkFreeDescriptorSets, and vkResetDescriptorPool are allowed. Otherwise, descriptor sets allocated from the pool must not be individually freed back to the pool, i.e. only vkAllocateDescriptorSets and vkResetDescriptorPool are allowed.

- `VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_UPDATE_AFTER_BIND_BIT` specifies that descriptor sets allocated from this pool can include bindings with the `VK_DESCRIPTOR_BINDING_UPDATE_AFTER_BIND_BIT` bit set. It is valid to allocate descriptor sets that have bindings that do not set the `VK_DESCRIPTOR_BINDING_UPDATE_AFTER_BIND_BIT` bit from a pool that has `VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_UPDATE_AFTER_BIND_BIT` set.

- `VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_HOST_ONLY_BIT_EXT` specifies that this descriptor pool and the descriptor sets allocated from it reside entirely in host memory and cannot be bound. Similar to descriptor sets allocated without this flag, applications can copy-from and copy-to descriptors sets allocated from this descriptor pool. Descriptor sets allocated from this pool are partially exempt from the external synchronization requirement in vkUpdateDescriptorSetWithTemplateKHR and vkUpdateDescriptorSets. Descriptor sets and their descriptors can be updated concurrently in different threads, though the same descriptor must not be updated concurrently by two threads.

- `VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_ALLOW_OVERALLOCATION_SETS_BIT_NV` specifies that the implementation should allow the application to allocate more than VkDescriptorPoolCreateInfo::`maxSets` descriptor set objects from the descriptor pool as available resources allow. The implementation may use the `maxSets` value to allocate the initial available sets, but using zero is permitted.

- `VK_DESCRIPTOR_POOL_CREATE_ALLOW_OVERALLOCATION_POOLS_BIT_NV` specifies that the implementation should allow the application to allocate more descriptors from the pool than was specified by the VkDescriptorPoolSize::`descriptorCount` for any descriptor type as specified by VkDescriptorPoolCreateInfo::`poolSizeCount` and VkDescriptorPoolCreateInfo::`pPoolSizes`, as available resources allow. The implementation may use the `descriptorCount` for each descriptor type to allocate the initial pool, but the application is allowed to set the `poolSizeCount` to zero, or any of the `descriptorCount` values in the `pPoolSizes` array to zero.

## See Also

VK_VERSION_1_0, VkDescriptorPoolCreateFlags

## Document Notes

For more information, see the Vulkan Specification

This page is extracted from the Vulkan Specification. Fixes and changes should be made to the Specification, not directly.

## Copyright

Copyright 2014-2025 The Khronos Group Inc.

SPDX-License-Identifier: CC-BY-4.0