A GPU that allows a device to be created meets or exceeds the functionality of that feature level.All Direct3D 12 drivers will be Feature Level 11_0 or better.The basic properties of feature levels are: You can either try to recreate a device at a lower feature level or you can choose to exit the application. If the device creation works, that feature level exists, if not, the hardware does not support that feature level. Now when you create a device, you can attempt to create a device for the feature level that you want to request. For instance, the 11_0 feature level implements the functionality that was implemented in Direct3D 11. A feature level is a well defined set of GPU functionality.

Each video card implements a certain level of Microsoft DirectX (DX) functionality depending on the graphics processing units (GPUs) installed. To handle the diversity of video cards in new and existing machines, Microsoft Direct3D 11 introduced the concept of feature levels. Describes the functionality of the 11_0 through 12_1 hardware feature levels.