Comparison of UI systems in Unity

Unity intends for UI(User Interface) Allows a user to interact with your application. More info
See in Glossary Toolkit to become the recommended UI system for new UI development projects, but it is still missing some features found in Unity UI (uGUI) and IMGUI. These older systems are more appropriate for certain use cases, and are required to support legacy projects.

This page provides a high-level feature comparison of UI Toolkit, Unity UI, and IMGUI, and notes about their respective approaches to UI design. Use it to help determine which UI system is appropriate for your project.

IMPORTANT
UI Toolkit is in active development. This page will update frequently as the feature set evolves.

General considerations

Type of UI: Editor or runtime

Your choice of UI system depends on whether you’re developing UI for the Unity Editor or runtime UI for a game or application.

Type of UI	UI Toolkit	Unity UI(uGUI)	IMGUI	Notes
Runtime (debug)	✔ *	✔	✔	This refers to temporary runtime UI used for debug purposes.
Runtime (in-game)	✔ *	✔	Not Recommended	For performance reasons, Unity does not recommend IMGUI for in-game runtime UI.
Unity Editor	✔	❌	✔	You cannot use Unity UI to make UI for the Unity Editor.

* Requires the UI Toolkit package, currently in preview.

To create runtime UI, your choice is between UI Toolkit and Unity UI (uGUI). See Feature comparison: UI Toolkit vs. Unity UI (uGUI).

To create UI for the Unity Editor, your choice is between UI Toolkit and IMGUI. See Feature comparison: UI Toolkit vs. IMGUI.

Roles and skill sets

Your team’s skill set and comfort level with different technologies is also an important consideration.

Type of user	UI Toolkit	Unity UI (uGUI)	IMGUI	Notes
Programmer	✔	✔	✔	Programmers can use any game development tool or API.
Technical Artist	Partial	✔	❌	Technical artists who are familiar with Unity’s GameObject-based tools and workflows are likely to be comfortable working with GameObjects, Components, and the Scene view. They might not be comfortable with UI Toolkit’s web-like approach or IMGUI’s pure C# approach.
UI Designer	✔	Partial	❌	UI designers who are familiar with UI creation tools are likely to be comfortable with UI Toolkit’s document-based approach. If they are not familiar with GameObject-based workflows, they might require help from programmers and/or level designers.

Innovation and development

UI Toolkit is in active development. Unity adds new features with each release. Unity UI and IMGUI are established UI systems that are production-proven, but updated infrequently.

Unity UI and IMGUI might be better choices if you need features that are not yet available in UI Toolkit, or you plan on supporting or reusing older UI content.

Feature comparison: UI Toolkit vs. Unity UI (uGUI)

This section compares UI Toolkit to Unity UI (along with the TextMesh Pro package) for developing runtime UI for games and applications.

• Unity Editor UI Development
• Workflow
• Styling
• Layout
• Events
• RenderingThe process of drawing graphics to the screen (or to a render texture). By default, the main camera in Unity renders its view to the screen. More info
  See in Glossary
• Animation
• Customizability

Unity Editor UI Development

It is not possible to develop user interfaces for the Unity Editor using Unity UI.

Workflow

Feature	UI Toolkit	UGUI+TMP	Notes
Nested Prefabs	Partial	✔	UI Toolkit’s UXML templates support attribute overrides, which are similar to modified properties in the Unity Prefab system. UGUI is GameObject based, and supports standard Unity Prefabs.
WYSIWYG authoring	✔	✔	Unity UI and UI Toolkit offer very different WYSIWYG authoring experiences. Because Unity UI is GameObject-based, you can set up the Scene view for WYSIWYG authoring. UI Toolkit provides the UI Builder package (currently in preview) for document-based WYSIWYG UI authoring with a web-like workflow.
Theming	Planned	❌	UI Toolkit roadmap includes support for theming functionality via the UI Builder and USS imports.
Layout & Styling Debugger	✔	✔	You can debug Unity UI interfaces in the Inspector window. UI Toolkit provides a dedicated debugger (menu: Window > UI Toolkit > Debugger) that is similar to debug tools found in major web browsers.
Scene integration	✔	✔	Unity UI GameObjects are visible in the Scene view and the Game view. You can integrate runtime UI created with the UI Toolkit package (currently in preview) via runtime components, and display it in the Game view.

Styling

Feature	UI Toolkit	UGUI+TMP	Notes
Inline styles	✔	✔
Cascading styles	✔	❌
Pseudo-states (for example, hover or active)	✔	✔	Unity UI provides simple pseudo states, and you can create complex pseudo states for it using Unity’s Animation graph. UI Toolkit supports pseudo-states via USS.
Rich text tags	Planned	✔	Rich text tag support in UI Toolkit is planned as part of an update to Unity’s text rendering backend. Unity UI supports a basic set of rich text tags by default, and a larger set via the TextMesh Pro package.
SDF text	Planned	✔	SDF text support in UI Toolkit is planned as part of an overhaul of Unity’s text rendering backend. Unity UI supports SDF text via the TextMesh Pro package.
Font fallbacks	Planned	✔	Support for font Assets and fallback fonts in UI Toolkit is planned as part of an overhaul of Unity’s text rendering backend. Unity UI supports fallback fonts via the TextMesh Pro package.

Layout

While Unity UI and UI Toolkit offer the same layout possibilities, their layout systems are quite different.

• With Unity UI, you control layout at the GameObjectThe fundamental object in Unity scenes, which can represent characters, props, scenery, cameras, waypoints, and more. A GameObject’s functionality is defined by the Components attached to it. More info
  See in Glossary level, using RectTransForm components.
• With UI Toolkit, you define layout in USS stylesheets, using a more web-like Flexbox-based layout system.

Feature	UI Toolkit	UGUI+TMP	Notes
Manual layout (absolute or relative to parent)	✔	✔
One-dimensional (horizontal and vertical)	✔	✔
Two-dimensional (grid)	Research	✔	Unity UI provides the GridLayoutGroup component. For UI Toolkit, Unity is investigating the possibility of implementing CSS-style grids in USS.

Events

Feature	UI Toolkit	UGUI+TMP	Notes
Integration with Unity’s new Input System	Planned	✔
Serialized events	Planned	✔	UI Toolkit can only bind events to elements in C#. Unity UI can serialize event bindings.
Visual Scripting for events	Research	❌

Rendering

Choosing between UI Toolkit and Unity UI is a tradeoff between high performance and versatility/supported features.

UI Toolkit currently supports a smaller set of capabilities, but is easier to optimize for rendering performance. It is document-based, data driven, and uses a single shaderA small script that contains the mathematical calculations and algorithms for calculating the Color of each pixel rendered, based on the lighting input and the Material configuration. More info
See in Glossary, material, and texture atlas to draw element hierarchies. It is a good choice for simple, screen space UI (for example, menus or heads-up displays) that includes complex hierarchies of elements, and performs well on any platform.

Unity UI is more versatile, and supports advanced rendering and text features. You can set up any visual element with a custom material, and take advantage of advanced clipping and masking features. However, these features might make it difficult to keep more complex UI within your performance budgets.

Feature	UI Toolkit	UGUI+TMP	Notes
Supported for Built-in Render Pipeline	✔	✔
Supported for Universal Render Pipeline (URP)	✔	✔
Supported for High Definition Render Pipeline (HDRP)	✔	✔
Screen-space (2D) rendering	✔	✔
World-space (3D) rendering	Planned	✔
Custom materials and shaders	Planned	✔
Shader Graph integration	Planned	❌
SVG integration	Planned	Planned	The com.unity.vectorgraphics package provides SVG support for Unity UI. However the package is currently in preview, and is not recommended for production.
Anti-aliasing	Planned	Partial	Unity UI’s Screen Space-Camera, and World Space rendering modesA Standard Shader Material parameter that allows you to choose whether the object uses transparency, and if so, which type of blending mode to use. More info See in Glossary use CamerasA component which creates an image of a particular viewpoint in your scene. The output is either drawn to the screen or captured as a texture. More info See in Glossary, which apply antialiasingA technique for decreasing artifacts, like jagged lines (jaggies), in images to make them appear smoother. More info See in Glossary.
2D rotation (object remains on the UI plane)	✔	✔
3D rotation	Planned	✔
Rectangle clipping	Partial	✔	UI toolkit supports rectangle clipping without rotation. The rectangle must be axis-aligned.
Mask clipping	Partial	✔	UI toolkit supports mask clipping with 2D rotation. Unity UI supports 3D mask rotation.
Nested masking	Partial/Planned	✔	UI toolkit’s nested masking is limited to one level, but does not affect draw-call batching. Multi-level nested masking is planned. Unity UI supports up to eight levels of nested masking, but breaks draw call batching every second level.

Animation

Feature	UI Toolkit	UGUI+TMP	Notes
Tweening workflow	Experimental	Partial
Integration with Animation ClipsAnimation data that can be used for animated characters or simple animations. It is a simple “unit” piece of motion, such as (one specific instance of) “Idle”, “Walk” or “Run”. More info See in Glossary and Timeline	Planned	✔

Customizability

Feature	UI Toolkit	UGUI+TMP	Notes
Open Source / Customizable	Planned	✔	The UI Toolkit package (currently in preview) is customizable.

Feature comparison: UI Toolkit vs. IMGUI

This section compares UI Toolkit to IMGUI for developing user interfaces for the Unity Editor.

• Inspector integration
• Controls and data binding
• Workflow
• Styling
• Layout
• Events
• Rendering
• Animation
• Customizability

Inspector integration

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Default InspectorsA Unity window that displays information about the currently selected GameObject, asset or project settings, allowing you to inspect and edit the values. More info See in Glossary	Planned	✔	UI Toolkit will become the default UI backend for Inspector windows (for when a type does not have custom editors).
Inspector: Edit custom object types	✔	✔
Inspector: Edit custom property types	✔	✔
Inspector: Mixed values (multi-editing) support	Planned	✔
Array / list-view control	Planned	✔

Controls and data binding

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Tree View	Planned	✔
Grid View	Planned	❌
Graph View	Planned	❌
Data binding: Serialized properties	✔	✔
Data binding from any C# type	Planned	❌
Data binding to any attribute or style value	Planned	❌

Workflow

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Nested PrefabsAn asset type that allows you to store a GameObject complete with components and properties. The prefab acts as a template from which you can create new object instances in the scene. More info See in Glossary	Partial	❌	UI Toolkit’s UXML templates support attribute overrides, which are similar to modified properties in the Unity Prefab system.
WYSIWYG authoring	✔	❌	UI Toolkit provides the UI Builder package (currently in preview) for document-based WYSIWYG UI authoring with a web-like workflow.
Theming	Planned	✔
Layout & Styling Debugger	✔	✔	IMGUI has a limited debugging tool for layouts and styles. UI Toolkit provides a dedicated debugger (menu: Window > UI Toolkit > Debugger) that is similar to debug tools found in major web browsers.
Scene ViewAn interactive view into the world you are creating. You use the Scene View to select and position scenery, characters, cameras, lights, and all other types of Game Object. More info See in Glossary integration	✔	✔

Styling

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Inline styles	✔	✔
Cascading styles	✔	❌
Pseudo-states (for example, hover or active)	✔	Partial
Rich text tags	Planned	✔	Rich text tag support in UI Toolkit is planned as part of an update to Unity’s text rendering backend.
SDF text	Planned	❌	SDF text support in UI Toolkit is planned as part of an update to Unity’s text rendering backend.
Font fallbacks	Planned	✔

Layout

While Unity UI and IMGUI offer the same layout possibilities, their layout systems are quite different.

• IMGUI uses the C#-based GUILayout system.
• UI Toolkit uses a more web-like Flexbox-based layout system. You control layout via USS styles.

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Manual layout (absolute or relative to parent)	✔	✔
One-dimensional (horizontal and vertical)	✔	✔
Two-dimensional (grid)	In research	❌	For UI Toolkit, Unity is investigating the possibility of implementing CSS-style grids in USS.

Events

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Integration with Unity’s new Input System	Planned	❌
Serialized events	Planned	❌
Visual Scripting for events	Research	❌

Rendering

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Supported for Built-in Render Pipeline	✔	✔
Supported for Universal Render Pipeline (URP)	✔	✔
Supported for High Definition Render Pipeline (HDRP)	✔	✔
Screen-space (2D) rendering	✔	✔
World-space (3D) rendering	Planned	❌	While it is technically possible to create 3D UI in IMGUI using GUI.matrix, it is not recommended.
Custom materials and shaders	Planned	❌
Shader Graph integration	Planned	❌
SVG integration	Planned	❌
Anti-aliasing	Planned	❌

Animation

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Tweening workflow	Experimental	❌
Integration with Animation Clips and Timeline	Planned	❌

Customizability

Feature	UI Toolkit	IMGUI	Notes
Open Source / Customizable	Planned		The UI Toolkit package (currently in preview) is customizable.

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