Packaging Android Projects

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This page takes a look how to package your Unreal Engine (UE) project for deployment to an Android device. The Android packaging process in UE is simple to use and outputs several convenient files for installing and uninstalling your project from phones for testing.

Essential Setup

First, it is better to fulfill the following requirements and project setup:

• You will need Android Studio set up on your computer. See Setting up Android SDK and NDK.
• Your Android device must have Development Mode and USB Debugging enabled. See Setting Up Your Android Device For Development.
• You will need to configure your Project Settings for Android and accept the Android SDK license agreement. See the Android Quick Start Guide.

If you have not already created a project, create one using the Third Person Template, with Target Platform set to Mobile and quality set to Scalable.

1. Packaging Your Project

This section explaines how to package the project as a .APK file.

In the example package configuration is set to Development for testing this game, but when your game is complete, you can package it using Shipping configuration. Navigate to Platforms > Android and select Shipping for setting packaging configuration to Shipping.

1. In the File menu, go to Package Project > Android and select the Texture format you want to package. This example uses Android ETC2 as it is supported by all devices.

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   Different devices support different Texture formats depending on the hardware they run on. See, Android Development Reference for a detailed breakdown of the various formats.

   Format	Description
   ETC2	Supported by all OpenGL 3.x class devices and supports alpha compression.
   DXT	Supported by Nvidia Tegra GPUs and supports alpha compression.
   ASTC	Latest Texture compression format allowing more quality control by specifying block size and supports alpha compression. Available on some devices at this point.

   If you are using an older version of Unreal Engine to support an existing project, you will also have access to the following legacy Texture formats.

   Format	Description
   ETC1	Supported by all Android based devices but cannot compress alpha textures (they are stored uncompressed). Recommend using an RGB and a separate alpha texture if need alpha to get better compression.
   ETC1a	Uses ETC1 for non-alpha textures and ETC2 for alpha texture. If the device does not support ETC2, alpha textures will be uncompressed into RGBA at runtime. This format can be used on both ETC1 and ETC2 devices, but ETC1 for non-alpha textures may not be as high-quality as ETC2.
   ATC	Supported by Qualcomm Adreno GPUs and supports alpha compression.
   PVRTC	Supported by PowerVR GPUs and supports alpha compression.

2. You will be prompted for a location to save your packaged game, which should default to your project folder. Create a new folder and call it AndroidBuilds.

   

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3. While your project is being packaged a packaging message will appear in the bottom right corner showing the progress of the packing.

   

4. Once packaging is successful, a Packaging Complete message will appear in the bottom right of the Editor.

   

5. Navigate to the folder you created in step two.

   

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2. Deploying A Packaged Project to Device

Now that you have packaged your project as a .APK, this section will instruct you on how to deploy your build to a device.

1. Plug your Android device into your PC with a USB cable. If prompted, allow your PC to change files.

2. Double-click on the Install_[ProjectName]_Development.bat batch file to install the project on your Android device.

   

   If you do not have your device plugged in via USB, running the .BAT file will do nothing.

1. Plug your Android device into your PC with a USB cable. If prompted, allow your PC to change files.

2. Open up the Android_ETC2 folder and then Double-click on the Install_[ProjectName]_Development_armv7-es3.command file to install the project on your Android device.

   If you do not have your device plugged in via USB, running the .command file will do nothing.

1. Plug your Android device into your PC with a USB cable. If prompted, allow your PC to change files.

2. Open the Android_ETC2 folder, where you'll find the files that were created during the packaging process.

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   You should see the Installation and Uninstallation shell scripts (.sh) along with the Android Application Package (.apk) that contains all of the files you need to install the project onto any Android device that supports the ETC1 compression scheme.

3. Now, open up the terminal from this folder's location by right-clicking inside of the folder and selecting Open in Terminal.

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4. Enter ./Install_LinuxAndroidProject_Development-arm64.es2.sh into the terminal to install the project onto your Android device.

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   If you're having trouble running the shell script, try entering adb devices into the terminal to verify that your device is connected to your computer.

5. During the installation process, the shell script should flush the following output to your terminal

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   When the shell script has completed the installation process, you should see an Installation successful message.

When you have completed this How-To, your project should appear on your Android device per the following image:

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In addition, you will have packaged .APK files and accompanying helpers to deploy them to other devices for testing.

Packaging App Bundles

Android App Bundles are a distribution format offered by Google as an alternative to packaging .APKs. Instead of creating different .APKs for different subsets of devices, you can create a single Android App Bundle build (.aab) and upload it to the Google Play Store. The store's dynamic distribution system then uses the contents of the App Bundle to generate a .APK optimized for the user's specific device when they download the application.

In addition to greatly condensing the work involved in maintaining builds on the Google Play Store, App Bundle builds can distribute .APKs with up to 150 MB instead of the previous limit of 100 MB. This limit applies to the final .APK and not the App Bundle used to generate it.

To create an App Bundle Build, open your Project Settings and navigate to the Platforms > Android section. In the App Bundles section, enable Generate Bundle (AAB).

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Now when you package a project for Android, you will generate a .aab file to upload to Google Play. You will also generate a universal .apk for testing purposes.

As a limitation of the Google Play Store, Android App Bundles can not be distributed with .obb files.

The other settings available for configuring App Bundle builds enable you to fine-tune the degree of sensitivity that the App Bundle will use in generating the final .apks for your project.

As an example, if you enabled ABI split but disabled language split, the .aab would tailor the final APK to a user's device based on the compatible ABI for their device, but every user would receive resources for all languages regardless of their device or language settings.

The default settings will result in the smallest possible size for the final .apk, while disabling these settings will result in larger .APKs.

For information on how to upload either .APKs or .AABs to the Google Play Store, refer to the guide on Shipping with Android.