GameObject.GetComponent

Parameters

Description

Returns the component of Type type if the game object has one attached, null if it doesn't.

GetComponent is the primary way of accessing other components. From javascript the type of a script is always the name of the script as seen in the project view. You can access both builtin components or scripts with this function.

using UnityEngine;

public class GetComponentExample : MonoBehaviour
{
    void Start()
    {
        HingeJoint hinge = gameObject.GetComponent(typeof(HingeJoint)) as HingeJoint;

        if (hinge != null)
            hinge.useSpring = false;
    }
}

Description

Generic version. See the Generic Functions page for more details.

using UnityEngine;

public class GetComponentGenericExample : MonoBehaviour
{
    void Start()
    {
        HingeJoint hinge = gameObject.GetComponent<HingeJoint>();

        if (hinge != null)
            hinge.useSpring = false;
    }
}

Parameters

Description

Returns the component with name type if the game object has one attached, null if it doesn't.

It is better to use GetComponent with a Type instead of a string for performance reasons. Sometimes you might not be able to get to the type however, for example when trying to access a C# script from Javascript. In that case you can simply access the component by name instead of type.

using UnityEngine;

public class GetComponentNonPerformantExample : MonoBehaviour
{
    void Start()
    {
        HingeJoint hinge = gameObject.GetComponent("HingeJoint") as HingeJoint;

        if (hinge != null)
            hinge.useSpring = false;
    }
}