TextField

A TextField lets users input text data into an application. It accepts and displays text input. You can set placeholder text to provide hints or instructions to the user on what to enter. You can also add validation functions to ensure that the entered data meets certain requirements.

Note: To align a TextField with other fields in an 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 window, simply apply the .unity-base-field__aligned USS class to it. For more information, refer to BaseField.

Create a TextField

You can create a TextField with UI(User Interface) Allows a user to interact with your application. Unity currently supports three UI systems. More info
See in Glossary Builder, UXML, and C#. The following C# example creates a TextField that allows multiple lines text input:

var textField = new TextField();
textField.label = "Enter your text here:";
textField.multiline = true;
textField.maxLength = 140;

Set a placeholder text

You can set a placeholder text for the element. You can also hide the placeholder text on focus.

Note: The placeholder text won’t display if you set a value for the element. To unset a value in UI Builder, right-click the Value field in the element’s Inspector tab and select Unset.

In C#, use the placeholder and the hidePlaceholderOnFocus properties through textEdition:

myElement.textEdition.placeholder = "Enter your value here";
myElement.textEdition.hidePlaceholderOnFocus = true;

To style the placeholder text, use the .unity-base-text-field__input--placeholder USS selector.

Customize the input text selection

Input text is selectable by default. You can customize the selection behaviors such as selectAllOnMouseUP and selectAllOnFocus.

In C#, set them through textSelection:

myElement.textSelection.selectAllOnMouseUp = false;
myElement.textSelection.selectAllOnFocus = false;

You can also style the selected text using the --unity-selection-color USS custom property. For example, the following USS sets the color of the selected input text to yellow:

.unity-base-text-field__input {
    --unity-selection-color: yellow;
}

Enable a vertical scrollbar

If you have enabled multiline text on the TextField, you can display a vertical scrollbar for the text input fieldA field that allows the user to input a Text string More info
See in Glossary.

In C#, set the verticalScrollerVisibility property to ScrollerVisibility.Auto or ScrollerVisibility.AlwaysVisible:

// Set the multiline property to true to enable multiple lines of text
textField.multiline = true;

// Set the vertical scrollbar visibility to AlwaysVisible
textField.verticalScrollerVisibility = ScrollerVisibility.AlwaysVisible;

Control the behavior of the input text

You can use events to control the behavior of the input text. The following example uses event callback functions to handle navigation and submission events for a text field. The example registers navigation events to the TrickleDown phase before they’re handled by the TextElement base class:

// A callback function that executes submit logic to handle user input submission. 
// It stops the propagation of the event to prevent it from reaching other event handlers.
myField.RegisterCallback<NavigationSubmitEvent>((evt) => {

    // Submit logic
    evt.StopPropagation();
}, TrickleDown.TrickleDown);

// A callback function that executes focus logic to handle navigation between different UI elements. 
// If the navigation direction is up, down, left, or right, it stops the propagation of the event and instructs 
// the focusController to ignore the event.
myField.RegisterCallback<NavigationMoveEvent>((evt) => {

    if (evt.direction == NavigationMoveEvent.Direction.Up || evt.direction == NavigationMoveEvent.Direction.Down || evt.direction == NavigationMoveEvent.Direction.Left || evt.direction == NavigationMoveEvent.Direction.Right)
    {
        // Focus logic
        evt.StopPropagation();
        focusController.IgnoreEvent(evt);
    }

}, TrickleDown.TrickleDown);

Example

The following UXML example creates a TextField:

<UXML xmlns="UnityEngine.UIElements" xmlns:uie="UnityEditor.UIElements">
    <TextField label="UXML Field" name="the-uxml-field" value="It's snowing outside." />
</UXML>

The following C# example illustrates some of the customizable functionalities of the TextField:

/// <sample>
// Get a reference to the field from UXML and append a value to it.
var uxmlField = container.Q<TextField>("the-uxml-field");
uxmlField.value += "..";

// Create a new field, disable it, and give it a style class.
var csharpField = new TextField("C# Field");
csharpField.value = "It's snowing outside...";
csharpField.SetEnabled(false);
csharpField.AddToClassList("some-styled-field");
csharpField.value = uxmlField.value;
container.Add(csharpField);

// Mirror the value of the UXML field into the C# field.
uxmlField.RegisterCallback<ChangeEvent<string>>((evt) =>
{
    csharpField.value = evt.newValue;
});
/// </sample>

To try this example live in Unity, go to Window > UI Toolkit > Samples.

C# base class and namespace

C# class: TextField
Namespace: UnityEngine.UIElements
Base class: TextInputBaseField_1

Member UXML attributes

This element has the following member attributes:

Inherited UXML attributes

This element inherits the following attributes from its base class:

This element also inherits the following attributes from VisualElement:

USS classes

The following table lists all the C# public property names and their related USS selector.

You can also use the Matching Selectors section in the Inspector or the UI Toolkit Debugger to see which USS selectors affect the components of the VisualElement at every level of its hierarchy.

USS custom properties

The following table outlines the custom properties that are available exclusively for the TextField element in USS:

Additional resources

• Work with text
• Label
• DoubleField
• LongField
• FloatField
• IntegerField
• PropertyField