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Developing with Spatial SDK

Updated: Sep 15, 2025

Welcome to spatial development

Meta Spatial SDK enables Android developers to create mixed reality experiences that blend digital content with the physical world. Spatial apps place objects, panels, and interactive elements anywhere in your environment. Traditional mobile apps stay confined to flat screens.
Spatial SDK introduces spatial anchoring, 3D scene management, and cross-device input handling. These capabilities need different mental models than traditional Android development. This guide navigates the transition and builds foundational knowledge for spatial app development.

Quick start crash course

To get started quickly, try the first app crash course. The crash course gives you a tour of Spatial SDK features and tooling, and gives you a basic working app to experiment with. You can start with an existing Android app or start from scratch.

Template project walkthrough

This path provides you with a foundation for building your own spatial apps.
Follow the template project walkthrough. This walkthrough covers:
  • Project directory structure with scenes/, assets/, and source organization
  • Modular package system for lightweight, focused spatial apps
  • Dual-activity architecture separating the 3D environment from UI logic
  • Spatial Editor workflow with asset pipeline automation
  • ECS implementation with runtime component modification examples
  • Dynamic scene loading and composition management
This isn’t an exhaustive list of all the features and capabilities of Spatial SDK. Instead, it’s a recommended learning path if you’re new to building spatial apps. Progress through the sections in order, and use the samples and showcases to explore more advanced features. Explore the other pages in the documentation for more detailed information, and use the API references to learn about specific classes and methods.

Key concepts

Spatial apps are organized differently than traditional Android apps. Understanding the Entity-Component-System pattern prevents expensive architectural mistakes.
  • Spatial SDK architecture: Learn how Spatial SDK works with Android apps and how your app can access Quest headset features.
  • Entity-Component-System (ECS) pattern: Learn a simple way to organize your app’s code using objects, data, and actions.
  • Components: Add data to your objects, like position, size, or color. Components hold information that your app needs.
  • Systems: Build systems that operate on specific components with logic.

Development tools

These tools are built to support Spatial SDK development, testing, and debugging.
  • Meta Android Studio Plugin: Get started quickly with ready-made project templates and tools to help build and test your app.
  • Spatial Editor: Build 3D environments by dragging and dropping objects where you want them. No coding required for basic layouts.
  • Data model inspector: Look inside your running app to see what entities exist and what components they contain.
  • Hot reload: See your code changes instantly on your headset without restarting your app or losing your place.
  • Input forwarding: Use your computer keyboard and mouse to test your app on the headset while you’re developing.

Build spatial experiences

These are the core, basic features that enable you to build immersive, interactive, and engaging spatial experiences.
  • Immersive scenes: Create 3D worlds where users can walk around and interact with objects.
  • Panels: Take your Android UIs and place them in 3D space where users can interact with them.
  • Input handling: Detect when users press controller buttons, use their hands, or look at objects to interact with your app.
  • Objects and assets: Add 3D models to your app and let users move, rotate, and change them.
  • Standard audio: Play sounds and music in your app.

Explore more features

  • Physics: Make objects fall, bounce, and crash into each other just like real objects.
  • Spatial audio: Make sounds come from specific locations in 3D space, getting louder when you get closer.
  • Mixed Reality Utility Kit: Scan the user’s room and place virtual objects on their real furniture and walls.
  • Passthrough camera API: Use the headset’s cameras to see the real world and add digital content on top of it.

GitHub samples

The Meta Spatial SDK Samples repository contains 11 sample applications demonstrating specific Spatial SDK features. Each sample focuses on a particular capability with complete source code, build scripts, and documentation.
Sample applications include:
These samples provide focused learning experiences for individual SDK features. Use them to understand API patterns, study implementation approaches, and experiment with specific capabilities before building your own applications.

Showcases

The Showcases directory contains five fully-featured applications available on the Meta store. These production-quality apps demonstrate complete Spatial SDK implementations and serve as architectural references for building commercial applications.
Featured showcase applications:
  • Focus (Meta store, GitHub): Productivity workspace with panel management, spatial object persistence, AI integration, and mixed reality task organization
  • Media View (Meta store, GitHub): Mixed reality media viewer supporting 2D/360-degree content, spatial media, and cloud storage integration
  • Geo Voyage (Meta store, GitHub): Educational exploration platform with interactive globe, AI companion, voice recognition, and geographic content integration
  • Meta Horizon UI Set (GitHub): Design system components and interaction patterns for spatial interfaces
  • Spatial Scanner (GitHub): Room scanning and spatial mapping demonstration application
Each showcase includes comprehensive documentation covering project structure, technical implementation details, and development best practices. Use showcases to understand full application architecture, study production-level code organization, and learn advanced feature integration patterns.
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