NVIDIA Nsight Systems
NVIDIA's GUI tool for performance debugging of CUDA C++ programs, combining profiling, tracing and expert-systems analysis.
NVIDIA Nsight Systems is a performance debugging tool for CUDA C++ programs. It combines profiling, tracing and expert-systems analysis in a GUI.
Why it matters#
Nobody picks GPUs because they're easy: they're expensive, hard to use and run a proprietary software stack. Teams reach for them when ordinary hardware isn't fast enough. That makes almost all GPU programs performance-sensitive, so performance debugging workflows, whether in Nsight Systems or other tools built on the CUDA Profiling Tools Interface, are mission-critical.
Learning the tool#
The Nsight Systems documentation is the reference, but watching someone use the tool is usually more helpful. For profiling GPU applications on Modal, see Modal's documentation.
Related#
- CUPTI: the profiling API Nsight Systems builds on
- Performance bottleneck: what profiling helps you find