Introduction to shaders

Understand the different types of shader, and key terminology.

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Last updated a month ago

A shader program, commonly referred to as a shader, is a program that runs on a GPU.

Types of shader

In Unity, shaders are divided into three broad categories. You use each category for different things, and work with them differently.

Shaders that are part of the graphics pipeline are the most common type of shader. They perform calculations that determine the color of pixels on the screen. In Unity, you usually work with this type of shader by using Shader objects.
Compute shaders perform calculations on the GPU, outside of the regular graphics pipeline.
Ray tracing shaders perform calculations related to ray tracing.

The terminology around shaders can be confusing; people commonly use the word "shader" to mean different things.

In this documentation, the terminology is as follows:

shader
?
or shader program - a program that runs on a GPU. Unless otherwise specified, this means shader programs that are part of the graphics pipeline.
Shader object
?
- an instance of the
```
Shader
```
class. A Shader object is a wrapper for shader programs and other information.
ShaderLab
?
- a Unity-specific language for writing shaders.
Shader Graph - a tool for creating shaders without writing code.
shader asset - a file with the
```
.shader
```
extension in your Unity project. It defines a Shader object.
Shader Graph asset - a file in your Unity project. It defines a Shader object.