Shader View Add-on

Shader View – A Smarter Way to Preview Your Nodes

Tired of endless switching nodes to the material output just to check their effect? Shader View simplifies your workflow by displaying real-time output previews directly above each node, making shader creation faster, efficient and more intuitive.

Work Smarter, Not Harder

Navigating shader trees can be frustrating, especially with complex materials. Instead of manually switching nodes to the material output, Shader View provides instant previews for all nodes in your material.

✨ Optimized for performance – designed to handle large shader trees smoothly.

✨ Customizable settings – adjust each node preview independently to fit your workflow.

✨ Intelligent – prevents node previews overlap, keeping the node editor clean and organized.

Seamless & Fast – Even on Big Node Trees

Shader View is built for performance. It renders node output previews in background process, ensuring a fluid workflow—even in heavy shader node projects.

Smooth and efficient even with node trees containing 200+ nodes. No lag, no slowdowns—just seamless shader editing

Works flawlessly with animated shaders, keeping your workflow fast and responsive even during playback

Set It Up Your Way

Everyone’s workflow is different. Shader View gives you full control over how previews are displayed. With per-node customizable settings, you can adjust each preview independently, ensuring the add-on works exactly the way you need it to.

(left) Choose the output socket you want to render; the selected socket will be highlighted. (right) Customize the preview size of each node preview for better visibility.

(left) Zoom in or out of node previews to focus on details. (right) Increase preview resolution for sharper details

(left) Switch between Plane and Sphere for preview rendering. (right) Select the camera type to see how your shader looks in perspective or orthographic views for more precise adjustments

Additionally, you can adjust the render sample count, switch between EEVEE and Cycles render engines, and toggle the lighting mode — especially useful when working with normal maps. All these settings can be customized independently for each node in your shader tree.

Smart Preview

Even though all previews are rendered as a post-process (POST_PIXEL) in the Shader Editor, the add-on efficiently manages them to prevent overlaps with other nodes and preserves the original "z-order" of shader nodes, keeping your node editor clean and organized.

(left) Turn ON. (right) Turn OFF

Key Features

✅ Real-Time Updates – edited nodes update instantly.

✅ Automatic Sync – update all connected nodes automatically.

✅ Background Process – render previews in the background to keeps Blender’s interface and workflow smooth and responsive.

✅ Non-Destructive – makes no changes to your .blend file, so others can open it without this add-on.

Who Is This For?

Anyone Working with Shaders – if you use Blender's Node Editor, this add-on will make your life easier!

Stop wasting time flipping between nodes and material output — get Shader View today and speed up your workflow today! 🚀

Changelog:

v1.0.5

• Fixed rendering preview for packed images.
• Fixed a minor bug with script nodes.

v 1.0.4

• Fixed incorrect rendering previews for Group Nodes.
• Improved z-ordering for better layering of Group Nodes.

v 1.0.3

• Fixed the issue causing crashes when deleting active texture nodes.