Unity supports the DirectX graphics API including both DirectX 11 and DirectX 12. However, not all features are available in DirectX 11. For more information, refer to Feature comparison of DirectX 11 and DirectX 12 in Unity.
You can choose to set DirectX 11 (DX11) or DirectX 12 (DX12) as your default Graphics API in the Editor or Standalone Player:
Open the Player settingsSettings that let you set various player-specific options for the final game built by Unity. More info
See in Glossary (menu: Edit > Project Settings > Player).
In the Other Settings > Rendering section, disable the Auto Graphics API for a platform (Windows/Mac/Linux) option.
Select the Add (+) button, then select Direct3D11 or Direct3D12 from the list of the supported Graphics APIs.
The following lists include the features introduced with the DirectX 12 graphics API, which are unavailable in DirectX 11.
| APIs | DirectX 11 | DirectX 12 |
|---|---|---|
| Dynamic resolutionA Camera setting that allows you to dynamically scale individual render targets to reduce workload on the GPU. More info See in Glossary |
Unsupported | Supported |
| Asynchronous compute | Unsupported | Supported |
| Native render pass | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray tracing acceleration | Unsupported | Supported |
| Graphics state collection | Unsupported | Supported |
| XR foveated rendering | Unsupported | Supported |
| Render Threading Mode | DirectX 11 | DirectX 12 |
|---|---|---|
| Direct | Supported | Supported |
| Single threaded | Supported | Supported |
| Main + render thread | Supported | Supported |
| Legacy jobified | Supported | Supported |
| Native graphics jobs | Unsupported | Supported |
| Split graphics jobs | Unsupported | Supported |
| ShaderA program that runs on the GPU. More info See in Glossary features |
DirectX 11 | DirectX 12 |
|---|---|---|
| Ray tracing shader | Unsupported | Supported |
Inline ray tracing (#pragma multi_compile _ UNITY_DEVICE_SUPPORTS_INLINE_RAY_TRACING) |
Unsupported | Supported |
Native 16-bit (#pragma multi_compile _ UNITY_DEVICE_SUPPORTS_NATIVE_16BIT) |
Unsupported | Supported |
Wave function (#pragma multi_compile _ UNITY_DEVICE_SUPPORTS_WAVE_ANY) |
Unsupported | Supported |
| Universal Render PipelineA series of operations that take the contents of a Scene, and displays them on a screen. Unity lets you choose from pre-built render pipelines, or write your own. More info See in Glossary |
DirectX 11 | DirectX 12 |
|---|---|---|
| Raster pass merging | Unsupported | Supported (Windows on ARM) |
| Native RenderPass | Unsupported | Supported (Windows on ARM) |
| Framebuffer fetch | Unsupported | Supported (Windows on ARM) |
| High Definition Render Pipeline | DirectX 11 | DirectX 12 |
|---|---|---|
| Hardware dynamic resolution | Unsupported | Supported |
| Asynchronous Compute Shaders | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray traced ambient occlusion | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray traced contact shadows | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray traced global illumination | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray traced reflections | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray traced shadows | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray traced recursion | Unsupported | Supported |
| Ray traced subsurface scattering | Unsupported | Supported |