A system, method, and computer program product are provided for parallel ray tracing traversal and intersection utilizing a single instruction multiple data (SIMD) processing architecture. In operation, a ray tracing traversal operation is performed utilizing one or more processing elements of the SIMD architecture. Additionally, a ray tracing intersection operation is performed in parallel with the ray tracing traversal operation, utilizing the same one or more processing elements. Furthermore, at least a portion of code utilized for performing the ray tracing traversal operation is the same as at least a portion of code utilized for performing the ray tracing intersection operation.