The server based graphics processing techniques, describer herein, include receiving function calls by a three dimension graphics application programming interface host-guest communication manager (D3D HGCM) service module from one or more given instances of a guest shin layer through a communication channel of a host-guest communication manager (HGCM). The one or more given instances of the guest shim layer are executing under control of a respective given instance of a guest operating system. The HGCM and D3D HGCM service module are executing under control of a host operating system. The rendering context for each function call received from the each instance of the guest shim layer is determined by the D3D HGCM service module. Each function call of a given rendering context is sent by the D3D HGCM service module to a corresponding device specific kernel mode driver of a given graphics processing unit for scheduling execution with the given graphics processing unit of the given rendering context.