5 Ways to Render Outlines in Unity

This article explores five distinct techniques for rendering object outlines in the Unity game engine: rim lighting, vertex extrusion, blurred buffer, jump flood algorithm, and edge detection. Each technique offers trade-offs between performance, visual fidelity, and implementation complexity. Rim lighting is simple but works best on spherical objects. Vertex extrusion produces good results but struggles with sharp edges. The blurred buffer method is great for soft outlines but can be performance-intensive. The jump flood algorithm excels at rendering wide outlines efficiently. Edge detection provides a full-screen outlining effect but requires careful tuning to avoid artifacts. The optimal choice depends on project needs and performance constraints.