Note: Unity’s Addressables system is the recommended approach for asset loading. The following content applies only if you use AssetBundles directly.
As all asset data must be pre-downloaded before your content starts, consider moving assets out of your main data files and into AssetBundles. Doing so creates a smaller loader sceneA Scene contains the environments and menus of your game. Think of each unique Scene file as a unique level. In each Scene, you place your environments, obstacles, and decorations, essentially designing and building your game in pieces. More info
See in Glossary that loads quickly, while AssetBundles dynamically load assets on-demand as the user proceeds through your content. AssetBundles also help with Asset data memory management: You can unload asset data from memory for assets that you don’t need any more by calling AssetBundle.Unload.
The following considerations apply when using AssetBundles on the WebGLA JavaScript API that renders 2D and 3D graphics in a web browser. The Unity WebGL build option allows Unity to publish content as JavaScript programs which use HTML5 technologies and the WebGL rendering API to run Unity content in a web browser. More info
See in Glossary platform:
When you use class types in your AssetBundle that aren’t used in your main build, Unity might strip the code for those classes from the build. This can cause a fail when trying to load assets from the AssetBundle. Use BuildPlayerOptions.assetBundleManifestPath to fix that issue, or refer to Distribution size and code stripping for other options.
WebGL doesn’t support threading. As HTTP downloads become available only after they’re downloaded, Unity WebGL builds need to decompress AssetBundle data on the main thread after the download is complete, blocking the main thread. To avoid this interruption, LZMA AssetBundle compression isn’t available for AssetBundles on WebGL and instead compresses using LZ4, which is de-compressed efficiently on-demand. If you need smaller compressionA method of storing data that reduces the amount of storage space it requires. See Texture Compression, Animation Compression, Audio Compression, Build Compression.
See in Glossary sizes than what LZ4 delivers, you can configure your web server to use gzip or Brotli compression (on top of LZ4 compression) on your AssetBundles. For more information on how to do this, refer to Deploying compressed builds.
WebGL supports AssetBundle caching with UnityWebRequestAssetBundle.GetAssetBundle. This method uses the IndexedDB API from your browser to store a cache on the user’s device. Some browsers might have limited support for IndexedDB and any browsers might request the user’s authorization to store data on the disk. For more information, refer to WebGL browser compatibility.