Getting started

Your game in a browser tab

SimplyStream runs Unreal Engine games in the browser. The game is compiled to WebAssembly and drawn with WebGPU on the player's own graphics card, so players install nothing and no cloud GPU runs behind them. Playing this way costs $0 per minute on every plan.

The same link can also stream the game from a cloud GPU, for devices that can't run it themselves, or use hybrid delivery, which is in early access. The launch page picks the mode when the player starts the game, and the session stays in that mode.

Strata, the build agent inside SimplyStream, turns your project into the web build, puts it online and plays it on a cloud GPU to check that it works before it ships.

What you need

• An Unreal project on 5.8 or 6.0, or none yet. Strata builds two engine lines: Unreal 5.8, and 6.0, the Unreal Engine 6 line. 5.8 is on every plan. 6.0 is on paid plans now and comes to Free on 1 June 2027. You can also start from a Marketplace or Fab asset you own.
• A SimplyStream account. The Free plan includes $10 of trial credits and two Strata runs a day. See Runs and allowances for the paid plans.

Players need a browser with WebGPU. It ships in Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari.

There is no engine to install

Strata builds your game on its own machines, with the SimplyStream engine already in place. It turns each version you send it into a web build, puts it online, and plays it on a real GPU to prove it works. There is no engine fork to clone, no SDK to build and no build machine to keep running.

Work in the Unreal Editor you already have, 5.8 or 6.0, or without an editor at all: a coding agent can change your project and send it to Strata without Unreal installed. Each project picks its engine line, 5.8 or 6.0, when it is created, and Strata builds every version of it with the newest release of that line.

Ways to start

Create your project on Home or under Projects. It opens on its Start page, which lays out the ways below with your project's details already filled in, and tells you when Strata starts building.

Start from a sample

No game of your own yet? If you own the project and it has no game in Strata yet, the Start page can offer Start from a sample first. Pick one of Epic's sample games and Strata makes it your project: nothing is downloaded, because your project is made from the sample where Strata already keeps it. Strata then builds it, and when the build is done you can play it from the Overview.

A sample starts with the sample's own finished build, which is not yours, so the page asks Strata to build your copy and shows each step. How long that takes depends on the game, and the page says when it is done. If the build cannot start, the page says so and offers Build it to try again. The sample is only a starting point: send changes the same ways as any project, below. Samples appear only while Strata has one ready, so a project that does not see this choice starts the ways below.

Connect your project to Strata, once

Strata keeps your game's files in a repository joined to your project. For now the dashboard cannot join one for you, so either:

• Ask us. The Start page has an Ask us to connect it button that writes the email for you, or write to [email protected] with your project's name and ID. We set it up and write back.
• Do it yourself. Sign in at app.stratavcs.com with the email you use here. Open settings, and under Agent tokens make a token that names a new repository, such as my-game, with read and push ticked: Strata creates the repository with you as its owner. Then open the repository and, on its SimplyStream panel, paste your project's ID (on the Start page) and your account API key (on your Profile), and choose Link.

Let a coding agent do it

Once your project is connected, its Start page makes a token for your agent and shows the line that connects Claude Code to Strata. Then it gives you a prompt to paste into the agent: it sends your game, waits for the build and the GPU check, and hands you the play link.

Starting from nothing, with no project here yet? An agent can create both. Paste this into Claude Code, Codex or any agent that can run commands, with your email and your game's name filled in:

Read https://api.stratavcs.com/v1/agent/guide and set me up on Strata: my email is YOUR@EMAIL and the game is MY-GAME. Keep going until it's deployed and verified, then send me the play link.

You get one email asking you to approve what the agent may do. After you approve, the agent creates the project, sends your game, waits for the build and the GPU check, and hands you the play link. It makes a new project, so use a name you have not used here already.

Send your project files

Install the Strata command line tool. On macOS or Linux:

curl -fsSL https://api.stratavcs.com/v1/cli/install.sh | sh

On Windows, in PowerShell:

irm https://api.stratavcs.com/v1/cli/install.ps1 | iex

Make a token on your project's Start page (or use the one you made on Strata's site), and give it to the tool:

export STRATA_TOKEN=YOUR_TOKEN

Then, in the folder that holds your .uproject file, name the repository, save this version and send it:

strata init --repo my-game
strata commit -m "First version"
strata push

Every push builds, puts the build online and checks it on a GPU. Next time, run strata commit and strata push again. Strata keeps its own history of your files and leaves out the folders Unreal makes for itself, so it works alongside Git without touching it.

Bring a project from Fab or the Unreal Marketplace

Strata can bring a Fab or Marketplace project in and build it, with no download to your computer. For now we start the import. Use Ask us to import it on the Start page, or write to [email protected] with the listing's link, and we tell you whether it can come in. For a project you bought on your own account, open it in Unreal on your computer and send it as files.

Already have a web build?

You can still upload a packaged build yourself under Releases, without Strata.

After the first build

Everything Strata does shows up on your project's pages here:

• Source: every version you sent, and the build each one produced
• Builds: each build, how long it took, and why one failed
• Quality: the frames Strata captured while playing each build, in both graphics modes, desktop-class and mobile-class
• Releases: which build players launch, and moving them to a newer one

You can ship again, run the checks again or move players to a newer build from those pages, if your role on the project allows it. The project's owner decides who can do what under Team and settings.

Players open your game from a play URL. To use a name on your own domain, such as play.example.com, verify the domain, add a play URL on it, and point its DNS at SimplyStream.

Verify your domain

1. Open Domains and add the domain you own, for example example.com.
2. At your DNS provider, add the TXT record that SimplyStream shows for the domain:
   • Name: _simplystream-verify.example.com
   • Value: the verification code shown next to the domain
3. Click Check verification now. SimplyStream also re-checks in the background, so you can close the page and come back. New DNS records can take a while to appear.

The domain's status changes from Pending Verification to Verified.

Add a play URL on your domain

A play URL points at one launch profile, which decides how the game launches.

1. Open your project's Launch setup page and go to Play URLs.
2. Click Add Play URL. Enter a name, such as play, and pick your verified domain and a launch profile. The button is available once the project has a verified domain and at least one launch profile.
3. At your DNS provider, add a CNAME record for the new host, here play.example.com, pointing at routing.simplystream.com.

Until that record exists, the play URL answers with Cloudflare error 1016. SimplyStream issues and renews the HTTPS certificate for the host; there is nothing to upload.

Use your own name for streaming servers

This applies to cloud streaming only. Streaming sessions connect to a server under ps.simplystream.dev unless you give them a route of your own.

1. On Domains, go to Nameservers and add one. The route is a name under a domain you control, such as stream.example.com.
2. Add the NS records SimplyStream shows for the route at your DNS provider, then verify it.
3. Use it for a whole project under Project Settings, DNS Nameserver, or for one play URL under DNS Nameserver Override when you edit it.

A nameserver can't be deleted while a project or play URL still uses it. The Domains page lists which ones do.

These settings matter only when a game is streamed from a cloud GPU, in cloud streaming or hybrid mode. A game that runs in the player's browser uses no server and needs none of them.

Server profiles

A server profile describes the cloud machines a streamed session runs on. Each launch profile that allows hybrid or cloud streaming names one server profile.

Profiles live on the Server Configurations page. SimplyStream provides system profiles you can use as they are. To change one, Clone it and edit your copy; only profiles you own can be edited or deleted.

What a profile sets

Warm machines start sessions faster and cost money while they wait, so Startup Speed is a trade between cost and how long players wait.

Credits and cloud sessions

Streamed sessions are paid from the credits on the project owner's account. When the account has no credits left, new cloud sessions are refused. Playing in the browser costs nothing per minute and uses no cloud machine.