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Local folder or tarball paths

Specify a dependency as a local folder or tarball that contains a package.
Read time 3 minutesLast updated 22 days ago
You can specify a dependency as any local folder or tarball that contains a package. This feature is helpful for local offline development and testing.
Note
If you want to reference a package on the local file system as a Git dependency, use the 
file://<url>
format instead. Unity doesn't support directly referencing a locally accessible Git repository with a file path. For more information on the 
file://<url>
format, refer to Git dependencies.
This section describes how to use the project manifest to set up a local dependency. If you want to use the Package Manager window instead, follow the instructions on these pages:
The path reference always begins with the 
file:
prefix, and uses forward slashes (
/
) for path separators.
Note
On Windows, you can also use backslashes (
\
), but only if you escape each one (for example, 
"file:..\\github\\my_package_folder"
or 
"file:C:\\Users\\my_username\\github\\my_package_folder"
). These paths aren't as easy to read as the forward slashes, they're prone to typing errors, and you can't use them anywhere but on a Windows machine. For these reasons, using forward slashes is preferable.
You can use either absolute paths, or paths that are relative to the project's 
Packages
folder (that is, the root folder of the project manifest). In other words, a path preceded with two dots (
..
) refers to the root of the project path, so that 
../another_folder
is a sibling of the 
Packages
folder.
Tip
Relative paths with forward-slashes offer better portability across different machines and operating systems when tracking a project and packages in the same repository.
For Windows absolute paths, the drive letter and its colon (usually 
C:
) follows the 
file:
prefix but is otherwise the same as Linux or macOS paths.

Example of a relative path

After the 
file:
prefix, the path is a standard relative path. In the following example:
  • The project's 
    Packages
    folder is 
    C:\Users\my_username\Projects\my_project\Packages
    .
  • The 
    Projects
    , 
    github
    , and 
    Downloads
    folders are peer folders.
  • my_package_c
    is an embedded package (a package whose folder was copied into the 
    Packages
    folder, to make it mutable).
{  "dependencies": {    "my_package_a": "file:../github/my_package_folder",    "my_package_b": "file:../Downloads/my_package_tarball.tgz",    "my_package_c": "file:com.unity.textmeshpro"  }}

Example of an absolute path in Linux or macOS

After the 
file:
prefix, the path is a standard Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX) path, starting with a forward slash 
/
:
{  "dependencies": {    "my_package_a": "file:/Users/my_username/github/my_package_folder",    "my_package_b": "file:/Users/my_username/Downloads/my_package_tarball.tgz"  }}

Example of an absolute path in Windows

Notice that the drive letter immediately follows the 
file:
prefix:
{  "dependencies": {    "my_package_a": "file:C:/Users/my_username/github/my_package_folder",    "my_package_b": "file:C:/Users/my_username/Downloads/my_package_tarball.tgz"  }}