Yes!* Additive Blending requires two or three fewer operations than Traditional Alpha Blending; it’s a single add (or an add and multiply if using the alpha) compared to an add, subtract, and two multiplied.
- This only actually matters if you’re rendering using an OpenGLES 1.0 or DirectX 7.0 GPU. But those class of GPU are effectively dead. On modern GPUs there’s no difference because the blend is done using hardware that can do any blend at the same “speed”. And even if that wasn’t the case, the difference between 2 or 3 math operations on modern GPUs, even low end mobile GPUs, is nigh unmeasurable.