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Authenticating with Steam

To enable Steam authentication, you need to set up the Steam identity provider in the Epic Online Services developer portal, and then enable the Steam online subsystem in your game.

Obtain your own Steam app ID​

To set up Steam authentication, you need to create a Steam app ID by paying the Steam Direct Fee.

info

You can't use app ID 480 with the EOS SDK since authentication changed from encrypted app tickets to session tickets.

Set up the Steam identity provider in the Epic Games Dev portal​

Once you have the app ID from Steamworks, you need to specify it in the EOS backend so that it can be used:

  1. Open the Epic Online Services developer portal and click on the product you are developing.
  2. Click "Product Settings".
  3. Under the "Identity Providers" tab, click "Add Identity Provider".
  4. Select "Steam" as the identity provider.
  5. Set the "Description" to any value you like.
  6. Leave "Encryption Key" empty. It is no longer used by Steam authentication and is not required to be set.
  7. You must set "SteamNetworkingIdentity" based on your Unreal Engine version:
    • If you are using Unreal Engine 5.4 or later (including preview builds), set it to "epiconlineservices", which should be the default value.
    • If you are using Unreal Engine 5.3 or earlier, set it so that it is empty. You will need to clear out the default value of "epiconlineservices".
  8. Set the "App ID" to the app ID of your Steamworks application.
  9. Click "Save & Exit".
  10. Under the "Environments" tab, click "Identity Providers" next to the Live sandbox.
  11. For Steam, select the new credential you just made.

Enable the Steam online subsystem in your game​

Open DefaultEngine.ini and add the following lines, replacing __YOUR_APP_ID__ with your Steam app ID.

[OnlineSubsystemSteam]
bEnabled=True
SteamDevAppId=__YOUR_APP_ID__
bUseSteamNetworking=false

You have now set up Steam authentication in your game.

Enable Steam avatars, friends and invites​

If you want to enable Steam avatars, friends, synthetic parties and invites, you also need to add the subsystem to the list of delegated subsystems in DefaultEngine.ini:

[EpicOnlineServices]
; This is a comma-separated list, so append ",Steam" if you already have delegated subsystems set.
DelegatedSubsystems=Steam

If you need the GetAvatarURL function of IOnlineAvatar to work on Steam, you'll need to supply a client web API key:

[OnlineSubsystemSteam]
WebApiKey=...

You can get a client web API key here. You must not use a publisher web API key obtained from the Partner Portal, as those are suitable only for backend servers (kept secret from clients).

Testing Steam authentication​

Steam authentication only works in packaged builds (not in the editor). In addition, for non-development builds it will only work when the game is launched through Steam. These are limitations of the Steam online subsystem, not a limitation of the EOS plugin.

It has been reported that Steam authentication also works in the following situations:

  • Right-clicking on the .uproject file and clicking "Launch Game".
  • Launching the game from Visual Studio in DebugGame configuration (not DebugGame Editor). This requires cooking game content.

For developers using a custom version of Unreal Engine (from source code)​

If you are using a custom version of Unreal Engine built from source code, you need to manually enable Steam support in your project's .Target.cs files.

In each .Target.cs file (the main one, the Editor variant and if you have it, the Server variant), you need to add this project definition:

ProjectDefinitions.Add("ONLINE_SUBSYSTEM_EOS_ENABLE_STEAM=1");