RAPID, a revolutionary fast optical to NIR camera applied to interferometry

The RAPID camera is an Avalanche Photo Diode array allowing very fast observation from the optical to the infrared with still a low noise per read. The camera born from a large collaboration within the FUI/FOCUS is intensively tested at IPAG (Grenoble) on an interferometric bench and will soon replace the actual camera of the PIONIER interferometer mounted on the visitor focus of the VLTi. We shortly present here the PIONIER instrument design and success to then focus on the RAPID tested performances. We will then resume the performance tests made on sky with the PIONIER. The RAPID camera is the first IR APD matrix ever mounted on an on-sky astronomical instrument. We show here how this fast, low-noise, large-band and sensitive camera improves PIONIER and the optical interferometry in general.