Procedural skybox

The Procedural skyboxA special type of Material used to represent skies. Usually six-sided. More info
See in Glossary 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 does not require any input Textures and instead generates a skybox purely from the properties set in the Material InspectorA 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.

Render pipeline compatibility

Feature	Built-in Render Pipeline	Universal Render Pipeline (URP)	High Definition Render Pipeline (HDRP)
Procedural skybox	Yes	Yes	No

Properties

Property	Description
Sun	The method Unity uses the generate a sun disk in the skybox. The options are: • None: Disables the sun disk in the skybox. • Simple: Draws a simplified sun disk into the skybox • High Quality: Draws a sun disk into the skybox. This is similar to the Simple sun disk, but with this mode, you can use Sun Size Convergence to further customize the appearance of the sun disk.
Sun Size	The size modifier for the sun disk. Larger values make the sun disk appear larger and setting this value to 0 makes the sun disk disappear.
Sun Size Convergence	The size convergence of the sun. Smaller values make the sun disk appear larger. This property only appears if you set Sun to High Quality.
Atmosphere Thickness	The density of the atmosphere. An atmosphere of higher density absorbs more light. Unity uses the Rayleigh scattering method to absorb light.
Sky Tint	The color to tint the sky to.
Ground	The color of the ground (the area below the horizon).
Exposure	Adjusts the sky’s exposure. This allows you to change tonal values in the skybox this Material generates. Larger values produce a more exposed, seemingly brighter, skybox. Smaller values produce a less exposed, seemingly darker, skybox.

Positioning the sun

If you choose to render a sun disk in your skybox (see Sun in Properties), this Shader uses the rotation of the active Light to position the sun in the skybox. To find the active Light:

Open the Lighting window (menu: Window > Rendering > Lighting Settings).
The Light assigned to Sun Source is your SceneA Scene contains the environments and menus of your game. Think of each unique Scene file as a unique level. In each Scene, you place your environments, obstacles, and decorations, essentially designing and building your game in pieces. More info
See in Glossary
’s active Light.
If there is no Light assigned to Sun Source, assign the Light in your Scene you want to become the active Light to Sun Source.

You can use this behaviour to create a simple day-night cycle. To do this, continuously rotate your main Directional Light around a particular axis.

Panoramic skybox

Skybox component reference

Unity Manual

Procedural skybox

Render pipeline compatibility

Properties

Positioning the sun