This period saw V-Ray dominate the market. Version numbers were largely consistent across platforms (3ds Max, Maya, Softimage).
| Version | Release Year | Key Breakthroughs | | :--- | :--- | :--- | | V-Ray 1.5 | 2005 | VRaySun & VRaySky (Physical Sky model). VRayPhysicalCamera. The render engine finally became "artists friendly." | | V-Ray 2.0 | 2010 | VRayRT (Real-Time rendering). First implementation of GPU acceleration (CUDA). Adaptive Lights. | | V-Ray 3.0 | 2013 | Progressive Rendering by default. VRayVolumeGrid (Phoenix FD integration). VRayStochasticFlakes for car paint. | | V-Ray 3.1 - 3.7 | 2014-2017 | NVIDIA Denoiser (Real-time noise removal). VRayAlSurface (Skin shader). Light Cache retrace. | vray all versions list
| Version | Year(s) | Key Innovations | |---------|---------|------------------| | 1.0–1.5 | 2002–2008 | First GI, photon mapping, VRaySun/Sky | | 2.0–2.4 | 2010–2013 | V-Ray RT GPU, VRayCarPaint, VRayFur | | 3.0–3.6 | 2013–2017 | Progressive rendering, denoisers, hybrid CPU+GPU | | 4.x (Next) | 2018–2020 | Scene intelligence, Light Path Expressions, RTX | | 5.x | 2020–2022 | Light Mix, VRayBitmap, Cosmos | | 6.x | 2022–2024 | VRayEnmesh, Chaos Scatter, cloud rendering | | 7.x | 2025–present | AI-assisted rendering, real-time caustics | Notable sub-versions: 1