To access the Oculus-VR fork of Unreal Engine, ensure you have a verified Meta Developer Account. Your Epic Games and GitHub accounts must also be linked. For detailed guidance and hardware requirements, see Prerequisites for installing Unreal Engine.

Set up your Meta Quest development environment by using one of the following methods:

UE 5.0+, built from Meta’s Oculus-VR fork of Epic Games’ UE 5.0+ (Recommended)

UE 5.0+, installed from Epic Games, and the Meta XR plugin

UE built from Meta’s Oculus-VR fork	UE installed from Epic Games
Recommended for all Meta Quest development in Unreal. Required for certain Meta Quest features: see Choosing UE Installation by Feature Compatibility.	May be necessary for multi-platform releases, such as simultaneous releases on Meta Quest and non-VR platforms.

Note: All supported Unreal Engine branches can create applications for all Meta Quest headset generations.

UE4 deprecation

UE4 is no longer the recommended version. For legacy UE4 installation instructions and compatibility information, see Legacy UE4.

Changes in Meta’s fork of UE

Since both Epic Games’ Unreal Engine and Meta’s Oculus-VR fork are open source, you can review every changed line in Meta’s fork.

GitHub Compare: Oculus-VR/UnrealEngine, 5.4 branch⁠

GitHub Compare: Oculus-VR/UnrealEngine, 5.5 branch⁠

GitHub Compare: Oculus-VR/UnrealEngine, 5.6 branch⁠

However, this examination may be too granular for most. The most important changes in Meta’s Oculus-VR fork are listed below:

Support for certain Meta Quest features, such as Application SpaceWarp. See Choosing UE Installation by Feature Compatibility for a complete compatibility matrix.

Meta Quest-specific improvements to rendering and performance. See Oculus-VR Fork Game Engine Performance Enhancement for a complete list.

Engine integration of Meta XR features, which removes the requirement to install Unreal Engine’s Meta XR plugin.

Installing UE 5.0+, Meta’s fork

This installation includes Unreal Engine 5.0+, the Meta XR plugin, and additional features and fixes that make UE work seamlessly with Meta Horizon OS. It’s recommended to use this installation for the latest support with Meta Quest features and improvements.

Note: It is not necessary to install the Meta XR plugin separately when installing Meta’s fork of UE 5.0+.

In the Oculus-VR fork of Unreal Engine on GitHub⁠, open the branch list, and then select the Tags tab.

Note: Remember that to access the Oculus-VR fork of the source code, you need a verified Meta Developer Account, as well as Epic Games and GitHub accounts that are linked. For more information, see Prerequisites for installing Unreal Engine.

From the list, select the UE version you want. The first version number in the tag name corresponds to the Unreal Engine version, and the last version number (prefixed with v) corresponds to the Meta Horizon OS version.

Note: It’s recommended to choose the latest version for the newest features and bug fixes.

Screenshot of Tags list in the Oculus-VR fork

Click Code, and then click Download ZIP to download the files.

Unzip the folder to the preferred location on your development machine.

Important: Paths that exceed the Windows maximum path length⁠ cause build failures. To keep paths short, avoid network shares, which also slow the build. Instead, create a junction point⁠ for the directory.

Build the engine by following the “Getting Up and Running” instructions in the README⁠.

Note: Building from source requires Visual Studio with the Game development with C++ workload installed.

Installing UE 5.0+ from Epic Games

Install UE 5.0+ directly from Epic Games using the Epic Games Launcher. You’ll need to install the Meta XR plugin separately. This means you’ll miss additional features and fixes in the fork. For more information, see Installing the Meta XR Plugin.

Install the Epic Games Launcher

Go to the Download Unreal Engine⁠ page and then click Download Launcher.

Complete Step 2: Install Epic Games Launcher on the same page.

Install the release version of UE 5.0+ from Epic

Open the Epic Games Launcher and log in.

On the Library tab, click the + next to Engine Versions.