Choose the mode by scene content, transparency ordering and how often that content changes. Start with Planar when diagnosing a new setup.
The five modes#
| Mode | Use and tradeoff |
|---|---|
| Planar | Live scene capture. General starting point for SpriteRenderers, Tilemaps, compatible particles and native 2D lighting. |
| Lightweight Sprite | Mirror selected Simple, unmasked, unskinned Sprite-Unlit-Default renderers without property blocks. No full scene camera/RenderTexture capture. |
| Cached | Store a capture until invalidated/refreshed. Useful for static scenery; moving actors and changed lighting can remain frozen. |
| Hybrid | Cache included static layers and update Dynamic Layers. Composite dynamic over static; interleaved transparent ordering needs Planar. |
| Mirror | Clean horizontal/vertical scene reflection. Suppresses waves/ripples; optional appearance, blur and fade can still apply. |
Lightweight Sprite requirements#
Set Object Filter = Include Selected and assign a nonempty Selected Renderers list. Sprites must pass object-layer and sorting-layer restrictions as well as the mode's compatibility rules.
Use Simple Sprite-Unlit-Default sources without SpriteMask, SpriteSkin, property blocks or split-alpha textures. Lit/custom materials, Tilemaps, particles and Sliced/Tiled sprites should use Planar. Tight-packed sprite distortion/blur is unsupported; use compatible rectangular/unpacked geometry or Planar.
The C# enum spelling is ReflectionMode.LightweightSprite.
Mirror orientation#
Horizontal reflects across local Y = 0. Vertical applies to Mirror mode and reflects across local X = 0, placing the destination to its left. Keep positive, orthogonal scale and the supported flat-plane geometry.
Cached and Hybrid tradeoffs#
Use Updates, caching & Hybrid to choose invalidation policy and split static/moving content. Planar is appropriate when exact scene composition or interleaved transparency matters. No mode implies a universal FPS or mobile performance guarantee.