A big problem when using Unreal Engine for small games, mobile games and 2D games is that even in those cases the package size is rather large.
<aside> 💡 A completely empty project with default settings will lead to a shipping build for Windows that is 321 MB large uncompressed with UE 5.3!
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<aside> ✅ The following steps will allow you to reduce the package size by over 50%!
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<aside> ✅ Reduces size by 371 MB 692 MB → 321 MB
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This is an obvious one that most developers should know about, but it can be fatal if overlooked. When packaging a game you can select between DebugGame, Development and **Shipping.
DebugGame** and Development come with additional files and tools that can be helpful during development, however when making a build to give to your players, you want to make sure to use Shipping to reduce the package size by over 300 MB.
<aside> ✅ Reduces size by 48.1 MB
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Unreal Engine games require certain packages and libraries to be installed on a Windows pc in order to be launched.
By default Unreal Engine will package the prerequisite installer together with our game, however in the project settings we can turn this off to make the package 48.1 MB smaller for Windows builds!
<aside> ⚠️ Disabling this is only recommended if you plan to distribute your game through Steam since they have their own process of installing prerequisites. If you distribute your game through Itch or other platforms, players which don’t have the prerequisites installed won’t be able to launch your game.
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