Data paths

A path like C:\Projects will become C:/Projects.

As mentioned in the , Godot considers that a project exists in any given folder that contains a project.godot text file, even if such file is empty.

Accessing project files can be done by opening any path with res:// as a base. For example, a texture located in the root of the project folder may be opened from the following path: res://some_texture.png.

Storing persistent files in such scenarios should be done by using the user:// prefix, for example: user://game_save.txt.

On some devices (for example, mobile and consoles), this path is unique to the project. On desktop operating systems, the engine uses the typical on macOS and Linux, and %APPDATA%/Name on Windows. Name is taken from the application name defined in the Project Settings, but it can be overridden on a per-platform basis using feature tags.

The editor uses different paths for user data, user settings and cache depending on the platform. By default, these paths are:

• User data contains export templates and project-specific data.
• User settings contains editor settings, text editor themes, script templates, etc.
• Cache contains temporary data. It can safely be removed when Godot is closed.

Note

If you use , the editor data paths will be located in subfolders in ~/.var/app/org.godotengine.Godot/.

If you create a file called ._sc_ or _sc_ in the same directory as the editor binary, Godot will enable self-contained mode. This will make Godot write all user data to a directory named editor_data/ in the same directory as the editor binary. This is useful to create a “portable” installation, which can then be placed on an USB drive.