CesiumJS Primitives & Geometry

Applies to: CesiumJS v1.142+ (ES module imports, ?? instead of defaultValue)

Architecture

The Primitive API is the low-level rendering layer beneath the Entity API, trading convenience for performance.

Core formula: Primitive = GeometryInstance[] + Appearance

• GeometryInstance -- positions a Geometry in world space with per-instance attributes (color, show).
• Geometry -- vertex data describing a shape (polygon, box, ellipsoid, etc.).
• Appearance -- GLSL shaders + render state + optional Material that shade the geometry.

Primitives are immutable after first render -- geometry cannot change, but per-instance attributes update via primitive.getGeometryInstanceAttributes(id).

Primitive