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Quickstart for ARCore Extensions for iOS

Get started with building your iOS apps using AR Foundation.

About AR Foundation

AR Foundation is Unity's high level, cross platform API to support Augmented Reality. AR Foundation lets you write your app once, and build for either Android or iOS.

For details about AR Foundation, see Unity's AR Foundation page.

Requirements

Hardware

  • ARKit compatible device that is also supported by ARCore.

  • A USB cable to connect your device to your development machine.

Software

The following Unity packages are also required, they will be installed automatically by the Unity package manager's dependency management system when you install the ARCore Extensions package in the next step:

  • AR Foundation package version 2.1.3.

  • ARCore XR Plugin package version 2.1.1.

  • Multiplayer HLAPI package version 1.0.4.

    You may install these packages manually yourself, but you may encounter compatibility issues if you do not use these versions.

Get the ARCore Extensions package

The ARCore Extensions for AR Foundation package is available from GitHub:

  1. Download the latest arcore-unity-extensions-*.tgz from the GitHub releases page.

  2. Extract the downloaded archive to a local folder. Make sure it's a location that is convenient -- after you install the package into your project, you won't be able change the folder's location or contents without first uninstalling the package. You may reinstall the package after changing the folder location.

Create a new project and import the ARCore Extensions package

  1. Open Unity and create a new 3D project.

  2. To import the ARCore Extensions package downloaded from GitHub into your project, follow these steps:

    1. Open the Package Manager (choose Window > Package Manager).

    2. In the top left corner of the Package Manager, click the + (plus) button. Choose Add package from disk…

    3. Locate the local folder where you unzipped the archive, and select the package.json file, then click Open.

    4. Wait a moment while Unity installs this and dependent packages into your project.

  3. Choose Window > Package Manager, and install ARKit XR Plugin package version 2.1.1 (required for building iOS apps).

    When upgrading your project from an earlier version of Unity to Unity 2019.1 or later, verify the following setting:

    Setting Value
    Player Settings > Other Settings > Script Runtime Version .Net 4.x Equivalent or higher

Configure project settings

  1. Select File > Build Settings.
  2. Select iOS and click Switch Platform.
  3. In the Build Settings window, click Player Settings.
  4. In the Inspector window, open the Other Settings menu.
  5. Configure the following settings:
    Setting Value
    Player Settings > Other Settings > Bundle Identifier Add your app's name in a reverse DNS format.
    For example, use com.mycompany.myapp
    Player Settings > Other Settings > Camera usage description Enter a description to explain your use of AR (for example, ARKit).
    Player Settings > Other Settings > Target minimum iOS version 11.0 or higher
    Player Settings > Other Settings > Architecture ARM64

Build and launch the app

Your development environment is now configured for targeting iOS with the ARCore SDK for Unity.

To build and try out the iOS sample included in the ARCore SDK for Unity, see the Quickstart for Cloud Anchors in Unity for iOS.

You can use the following steps for building and launching your own ARCore apps targeting iOS.

Build for iOS

  1. In Unity, click Build and select an output folder for your iOS Xcode project. An Xcode project is generated.

  2. Locate and open the generated Unity-iPhone.xcworkspace workspace file in Xcode.
    To avoid build errors, do not build or launch from the included Unity-iPhone.xcodeproj project file.

  3. In Xcode, select the Unity iOS project in the left pane, connect your device, and launch your app.

Next steps