Getting Started
This section takes you from nothing installed to a running editor and a first project on Unreal Engine Vite. Read Introduction to Vite first if you have not yet decided whether the fork is right for your project.
Choose how you install
Vite ships in two forms. They are functionally the same editor; the difference is whether you compile the engine yourself.
Installed binary build | Source build | |
|---|---|---|
Setup time | Minutes | 15–30 min compile, plus dependency download |
Disk footprint | Smaller, no intermediates | Large, includes full source and intermediates |
Can modify engine code | No | Yes |
Can debug into engine code | Only with symbols shipped | Yes |
Recommended for | Artists, designers, evaluation | Programmers, anyone contributing to the fork |
Most teams run a mixed setup: engineers on source builds, everyone else on an installed build produced from the same commit. See Installed Builds for how to produce one.
Steps in order
Check System Requirements so you know what hardware and disk space you need.
Install the Toolchain Requirements. This step is mandatory and unforgiving — the wrong MSVC or Windows SDK version produces confusing compile errors rather than a clear message.
Either Install a Binary Build or Build from Source.
Create your First Project.
If you are bringing existing content across, read Migrating from Unreal Engine 5.
If anything fails along the way, Build Troubleshooting covers the errors that come up most often, including the C4668: '__has_feature' is not defined error that signals a toolchain mismatch.
What is different from stock Unreal Engine 4.27
If you have built Unreal Engine from source before, three things will surprise you.
GitDeps is already patched. Stock 4.27 fails to download dependencies because the CDN endpoints have moved. Vite ships the fix, so Setup.bat works with no manual edits. When Setup.bat asks whether to overwrite local changes, answer N.
Ray tracing is on by default. New projects enable ray-traced shadows, reflections, translucency and ambient occlusion out of the box. This is deliberate, so that the features are discoverable, but it means a new empty project is heavier than a stock 4.27 one. See Ray Tracing for how to turn individual effects off.
Several engine defaults are changed for performance. Overlap events, skeletal mesh settings, lightmap UV generation and a number of plugins differ from stock. These changes affect gameplay behaviour, not just frame time, so read Engine Default Changes before you ship.
Unreal Engine fundamentals
This manual documents the fork, not the engine underneath it. Everything Vite does not change works the way Unreal Engine 4.27 works, and Epic's own 4.27 documentation is the correct reference for it:
Topic | Epic's 4.27 documentation |
|---|---|
Projects, templates and directory structure | |
Setting up Visual Studio for source builds | |
Blueprints and the gameplay framework |
Keep the version selector on 4.27. UE5 documentation describes systems Vite deliberately does not have, and following it is a common source of confusion for people arriving from UE5.