# AR Foundation Samples: Unity's Official AR Example Project, Branch by Branch > The repository is a Unity project you build to a phone or headset, not a package you install. Its real constraint is version matching: the main branch tracks AR Foundation 6.4 and Unity 6000.0 and newer, and older Unity versions live on separate branches. **Unity-Technologies/arfoundation-samples** — Example content for Unity projects based on AR Foundation - Repository: https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/arfoundation-samples - Stars: 3,435 · Forks: 1,250 - Language: C# - License: NOASSERTION - Published: 2026-09-23 · Updated: 2026-09-23 · Language: en - Canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/unity-technologies-arfoundation-samples ## What AR Foundation Samples actually is, and who it is for AR Foundation is a Unity package that lets one project target several augmented reality runtimes. This repository is the sample content that ships alongside it: a complete Unity project you can open, build, and run on a device. The README calls it "the official AR Foundation sample app that you can download, build to your device, and use as a starting point for your own projects." The audience is narrow and specific. You are a Unity developer who has decided to use AR Foundation and now needs to see how each feature is wired up. The project demonstrates four platform and plug-in pairings: Google ARCore XR Plug-in on Android, Apple ARKit XR Plug-in on iOS, Unity OpenXR: Meta on Meta Quest, and Unity OpenXR: Android XR on Android XR. If your target is none of those four, the samples will not map onto your runtime. It is not a library. Nothing here is meant to be imported into your game as a dependency. The README describes the intent plainly: each AR Foundation feature appears in a minimal sample scene with example code you can modify or copy. ## How the samples are organised: scenes, code, and one repository per Unity version The repository is a standard Unity project layout: Assets/, Packages/, ProjectSettings/, plus .github/, .gitignore, CONTRIBUTING.md, LICENSE.md and README.md at the top level. All sample scenes live in the Assets/Scenes folder, and the README points at the AR Foundation samples page in the official user manual for explanations of how each scene works. That documentation has moved out of the repository and into the package manual, which means the repository itself is mostly code and scenes rather than prose. The versioning model is the part worth understanding before you clone anything. The main branch uses AR Foundation 6.4 and is compatible with Unity 6000.0 and newer. Other Unity versions are served by other branches: 6.5 for Unity 6.5 beta (6000.5), 6.3 for Unity 6.3 LTS (6000.3), 6.0 for Unity 6.0 LTS (6000.0), and 5.2 for Unity 2022.3, which the README marks as Enterprise license only. Note the mismatch in the README itself: the version table says main carries AR Foundation 6.4, while the prose above it says main uses AR Foundation 6.3. That inconsistency is visible in the document as published, and it is the kind of detail you resolve by opening Packages/manifest.json in the branch you actually checked out rather than by trusting either line. Because each branch is pinned to a Unity generation, a sample you copy out of the 6.0 branch may not compile unchanged against the 6.4 packages. Copying a scene is a starting point, not a port. ## Building the samples to a device: install and first run There is no package manager step. The README's instructions are three numbered actions: install Unity 6000.0 or newer, clone the repository, open the Unity project at the root, then use the Build Profiles window to select a target platform and build. Cloning is the only command-line step, and the repository URL below is the one the README names as the project itself. ```bash git clone https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/arfoundation-samples.git ``` After cloning, open the folder as a project in Unity Hub with a 6000.0-or-newer editor. Unity will import the Assets/ and Packages/ folders; the sample scenes appear under Assets/Scenes in the Project window. What you should see is a set of minimal scenes, one per AR Foundation feature, rather than a single monolithic demo app. To put one on a device, open the Build Profiles window from the Unity editor, choose your target platform, and build. The README points at the Build Profiles reference page in the Unity manual for that window, and treats it as the same flow you would use for any Unity project. The platform you pick determines which plug-in is exercised: ARCore for Android, ARKit for iOS, Unity OpenXR: Meta for Meta Quest, Unity OpenXR: Android XR for Android XR. If you build an Android target onto a device without ARCore support, the AR features in the scenes will not come up, and nothing in the sample project changes that. ## Where the samples stop being useful The most concrete limitation is stated outright: the maintainers are not accepting pull requests. If you fix a bug in a sample or improve one for your own use, that change stays in your fork. The README directs issues and sample requests to GitHub issues instead, so the repository is a read-and-copy resource rather than a place you contribute back to. Bug reports have a similar shape. The README says GitHub issues are unofficial for AR Foundation bugs and will be closed if they lack an official bug ID number. The supported path is Unity's own bug reporting process. So if you hit a defect inside AR Foundation itself, this repository is the wrong place to raise it, and a well-written GitHub issue with no bug ID will be closed. Feature requests go somewhere else again: Unity's XR Roadmap, under the AR Foundation tab and the Submit a New Idea action. That is three separate channels for three kinds of feedback, and none of them is a pull request. The other case where this is the wrong tool is licensing. The repository's licence identifier is NOASSERTION, and the README says nothing about what the samples may be reused for. If you intend to lift sample code into a commercial product, the LICENSE.md file at the root is the thing to read, and it is not summarised anywhere in the README. ## Compared with the AR Foundation package manual and Unity's AR template The obvious alternative is the AR Foundation user manual itself, which is where the sample explanations now live. The difference is the medium. The manual explains concepts and API usage in prose; this repository gives you runnable scenes and the code behind them. If you want to understand what plane detection or image tracking means in AR Foundation, the manual is the faster read. If you want to see the scene hierarchy and the component wiring that make it work, the repository is the only one of the two that has it. A second alternative is starting from a blank Unity project and adding AR Foundation yourself. That gives you no sample code and no reference scenes, but also no branch-to-Unity-version coupling to manage. The repository's value is precisely the coupling: each branch is a known-good pairing of Unity version, AR Foundation version and platform plug-ins. The cost is that you inherit that pairing and have to keep it in sync. Neither alternative is a drop-in substitute, because neither is a project you build to a device in three steps. ## Conclusion Adopt it if you are starting an AR Foundation project on Unity 6000.0 or newer and want working reference scenes for each feature before writing your own. Do not adopt it as a runtime dependency, as a source of pull request feedback, or on a Unity version that does not match the branch you checked out. Verify first that your Unity version lines up with the branch table in the README, that the scenes you need exist under Assets/Scenes, and that the target platform's plug-in (ARCore, ARKit, Unity OpenXR: Meta or Unity OpenXR: Android XR) is the one your device uses. ## FAQ ### What is AR Foundation? According to the README, AR Foundation is a Unity package that enables you to create multi-platform augmented reality apps with Unity. This repository holds the official sample content for it, with one minimal scene per feature. ### How can I develop augmented reality using Unity? The README's path is to install Unity 6000.0 or newer, clone the AR Foundation Samples repository, open the project at its root, then pick a target platform in the Build Profiles window and build. The samples cover Android via ARCore, iOS via ARKit, Meta Quest via Unity OpenXR: Meta, and Android XR via Unity OpenXR: Android XR. ### Does Unity support AR? The repository demonstrates AR support through AR Foundation across four platform and plug-in pairings: Google ARCore XR Plug-in, Apple ARKit XR Plug-in, Unity OpenXR: Meta, and Unity OpenXR: Android XR. Support for a given device still depends on that platform's plug-in. ## Sources - [Issues](https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/arfoundation-samples/issues) - [README](https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/arfoundation-samples/blob/main/README.md) - [Unity-Technologies/arfoundation-samples on GitHub](https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/arfoundation-samples) --- Hysen Labs editorial analysis, written from the project's own repository and release notes. Cite the canonical page: https://hysenlabs.com/projects/unity-technologies-arfoundation-samples