<p>The building sector significantly contributes to global energy consumption and environmental degradation, particularly in rapidly urbanizing arid and semi-arid regions like Kabul city, which experiences extreme seasonal temperature variations. This study aims to analyze and optimize fixed and removable passive shading strategies by assessing their effectiveness in enhancing building energy efficiency under challenging climatic conditions. Building models were developed in DesignBuilder v7 and simulated using the EnergyPlus engine to comparatively evaluate the impact of common shading strategies across different building orientations. The analysis focused on their contribution to reducing building energy demand and solar gain during both hot and cold periods. Simulation results demonstrate a strong dependency of solar gain and thermal energy demand on building orientation and shading configuration. North-facing rooms showed minimal solar gain, resulting in high winter heating and low summer cooling, making shading negligible. East- and west-facing rooms received substantial solar radiation, with effective shading strategies reducing total energy demand by 0.04–4.9 percent for east-facing rooms and 1.0–7.0 percent for west-facing rooms compared to the least efficient cases. South-facing rooms benefited from winter passive solar gains and limited summer heat, with effective shading strategies achieving reductions of 4.9–15.8 percent. Removable shading further enhanced seasonal performance, lowering total energy demand by 2.5–5.2 percent for east-facing rooms, 4.0–20.8 percent for south-facing rooms, and 4.2–6.4 percent for west-facing rooms, emphasizing the importance of adaptive, orientation-specific, and climate-responsive shading designs. These findings highlight the critical importance of climate-responsive design and optimized shading in reducing operational energy use and provide practical guidance for sustainable architecture.</p>