Shipping an Unreal Engine 5 plugin without its source

Sometimes you need to hand someone an Unreal plugin without handing over the code: an SDK for partners, a paid plugin, or a tool you can’t open-source yet. Unreal supports this, but “delete the Source folder” is not the answer. UnrealBuildTool still needs part of it.

These notes are for UE 5.3 on Windows. The ideas carry over to other versions, but a binary plugin only loads in the engine version it was built for. Ship one package per engine version.

1. Build it with BuildPlugin

The Package button in the editor’s Plugins window runs the same UAT command, so you may as well call it directly and script it:

Engine\Build\BatchFiles\RunUAT.bat BuildPlugin ^
  -Plugin="C:\Work\MyPlugin\MyPlugin.uplugin" ^
  -Package="C:\Out\MyPlugin" ^
  -TargetPlatforms=Win64

It is worth knowing what this does, because it explains what you can delete later:

It copies the plugin into a throwaway host project and builds it there: UnrealEditor Development for your host platform, and UnrealGame Development and Shipping for each target platform.
It copies the build products into the package, along with Source, Content, Resources, Shaders, the generated headers under Intermediate/Build/.../Inc, and anything listed in Config/FilterPlugin.ini. Tests folders are left out.
It rewrites the packaged .uplugin with "Installed": true and the engine version it was built against. You don’t need to add either by hand.

Make sure this build succeeds before you remove anything. Everything after this point happens in the package folder, never in your working copy.

2. Tell UnrealBuildTool not to compile

In the packaged plugin, open each module’s Build.cs and add one line:

public class MyPluginRuntime : ModuleRules
{
    public MyPluginRuntime(ReadOnlyTargetRules Target) : base(Target)
    {
        bUsePrecompiled = true;

        PublicDependencyModuleNames.AddRange(new[] { "Core", "CoreUObject", "Engine" });
        PrivateDependencyModuleNames.AddRange(new[] { "Slate", "SlateCore" });
    }
}

bUsePrecompiled makes UBT link the binaries you shipped instead of trying to build the module, which would fail without the .cpp files. Keep the dependency lists. UBT still uses them to work out what your module links against when it builds the user’s project.

3. Strip the source

Inside Source/<Module>/:

Keep the Build.cs. A plugin with no C++ users still needs it, because UBT discovers modules through these files.
Keep the public headers your users need to call your code from C++. If nobody will use the plugin from C++, you can delete all headers.
Delete every .cpp and every private header.

This is where a clean Public/Private split pays off. If your public headers include private ones, you’ll find out now.

4. Decide what binaries to ship

Binaries/Win64/*.dll is what the editor loads. Keep it.
Binaries/Win64/*.pdb holds debug symbols. They’re large and make reverse engineering easier, so delete them unless you want users to get readable crash stacks.
Intermediate/Build/Win64/UnrealGame/{Development,Shipping}/... holds the static .lib files. Packaged games link plugins statically, so without these the user’s project opens and runs in the editor but fails to package.
Intermediate/Build/Win64/UnrealEditor/... holds the libraries C++ projects link against in the editor. Keep them if users will call your code from C++. A private editor-only module doesn’t need its libraries in either folder.

Some sellers use that UnrealGame gap for trial builds: ship without it, and the plugin works in the editor but can’t be packaged until the user buys the full version.

5. Test it like a user

Two checks catch nearly every mistake:

Put the stripped package in a fresh C++ project’s Plugins folder. Generate project files, build, open the editor, then package a Shipping build.
Do the same in a Blueprint-only project, which has no compiler step and will fail loudly if anything still expects source.

If UBT tries to compile your module, a Build.cs is missing bUsePrecompiled. If packaging fails at link time, an UnrealGame library is missing.