Unreal Engine 5 Water System (Buoyancy Physics, Oceans, Rivers, Lakes) | Beginner Tutorial

In this video, we'll be showing you how you can make the most of Unreal Engine 5's new water system system to quickly and dynamically create oceans, rivers, lakes & make objects float with Bouyancy.
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0:00 - Intro
0:35 - Landscape setup
2:19 - Creating oceans
5:14 - Customising the waves
9:23 - Customizing the water material
12:24 - Creating rivers
16:43 - Creating floatable objects
22:03 - Outro
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[@jt-el8540]

For beginners this guy is truly one of the best.

[@VirtusEdu]

I'm really happy to hear that, I hope I can help you on your journey! :)

[@mjesensky2760]

Virtus is back!! :D Good to see you posting videos again, I'm looking forward to your new turorials! Thank you for your hard work!

[@VirtusEdu]

You're very welcome!

[@TAPcast]

Started learning how to code in UE from your videos. Pro. Love it and keep it up!

[@hunin27]

Thank you! This tutorial was clear and concise, really easy to follow along. And explained perfectly!

[@realmaxdev]

Thanks so much, i have just moved out of unity and switched to ue5, you have been a real lifesaver with these amazing tutorials!

[@TGMaiam]

excellent video, this is what I was looking for... Thanks a lot!

[@victorgross3722]

Bit late to the party but I figured I would post this for any others having issues. Ran into a problem with 5.1 with my tutorial where after adding all the pontoons and doing everything correctly, my boat just straight sank. I tore my hair out for almost an hour before realizing it was a simple issue. I placed the blueprint too deep into the water for my pontoon points. It might be obvious for most but just in case anyone else is having a similar issue, there's a fix! Fantastic tutorial, by the way. Very helpful.

[@victorgross3722]

@@K1N3RGY As I said above, this was on 5.1. I have not gotten around to testing it on 5.2, yet.

[@MorneBooysen]

@@victorgross3722 5.3 i'm struggling and seems volumes need to be moved around but leaves gaps in world between landscape and water volumes

[@joshua42777]

Thank you so much for doing this!

[@kristianhig3283]

hey man this really works on my device! Thanks for sharing.

[@spudnickuk]

This looks good for Cartoon type games if for more realistic look and the user is ok to now how to change the the shader values and replace the water texture then set to 0.1 transparency and add a foam transparency of 0.3 in the Alpha and setup a spline of foam around the shore lines.

[@VirtusEdu]

You're right, once you adjust all of those settings you can get some really incredible results!

[@XIIMark]

How can we do that? I'm new to all of this, texturing etc can you please make a Tutorial or elaborate? thanks!

[@juancarlosgzrz]

@@XIIMark @spudnickuk

[@user-nv4cn2oq8u]

@@VirtusEdu That case is when the comments are more precise and specific than the lesson!

[@sylversoul88]

There are triple A games out there that are in more of a cartoon style and are not aiming for photorealism. That doesn't mean they are not expert. Games are made in different styles. I'm sorry but it is ill-mannered and ignorant to disqualify this channels work and efforts. If you are so much more expert then make your own KZbin channel.

[@lugame1870]

It helped me a lot, thank you!

[@thtkidobiwan5671]

Really nice and helpful... Thanks!

[@noliebowtie1315]

You are creating such a library of videos for UE5, that it's almost to the point that someone could create a full game just by watching them!

[@VirtusEdu]

That's the goal!

[@twintek1099]

That's what i'm trying to do.

[@twintek1099]

no idea how to code other than scratch and python lol

[@Phairphax]

@@VirtusEdu I love you, lol thank you so much these videos are incredibly helpful, seriously. it means a lot to myself and my family. More than I can share atm.

[@CruelCrusader90]

@@twintek1099 same! i think my goal far exceeds my skills but with all the vids out there ill close that gap XD

[@RSProduxx]

man... been watching quite a few videos about this topic... and this is so effin straight forward and everything I currently need.. This helps alot, you can´t imagine :) next step, add player controller to floaty thing ... you don´t have videos on that topic, do you? :)

[@Oziverse1610]

What a great tutorial, thanks!

[@matiasfare1884]

Your videos are great! Thanks for sharing!

[@grundvater]

Geniales Video. Super gemacht und erklärt. Danke Dir.

[@N0LYF3]

Dope. Thanks again!

[@soizicgremont4352]

Very cool tutorial ! Do you know how can i make a level sequencer with my mesh floating but with animation key on it ? It follows my directions but without the floating effects, do you have any idea why ?

[@itsMBWAAA]

Many thanks dude! Liked and subbed

[@birdsteak9267]

A good tip, whenever you into folders and settings, have an extra window om screen with a zoom in. Its not fun to push my face to the screen just to make sure i am doing it correctly! My screen is a bit far away too 😂 Love the video!

[@Demonic_Emperor]

Hey there! Helpful tutorial so far. But, I have a question, what if I've already blocked out a landscape, and then add the water in, is there a way I can make it not adjust the landscape itself?

[@GarDjinn]

new to unreal so this is a great start

[@carljthatsme94]

Excellent tutorial.

[@7WeirdSeeds]

Thanks, great tutorial! I don't know if it's just me, but the transition with the blue layer scares me every time as it reminds me of BSOD. But it did help staying focused.

[@ChrisChoiThird]

Thank you for the good tutorial!!

[@VirtusEdu]

You are welcome!

[@Demonleonardo]

Hello, I want to know what version you used, I used Unreal 5.O.3, and my buoyancy component didn't work well, do you know how to fix it?

[@user-vn7gh4ir6m]

really helpful video but can you make a video on how to get the water system working on a landscape that uses a custom height map and has multiple land masses?

[@Obiwahn89]

Nice high quality tutorial!

[@VirtusEdu]

Thank you!

[@docfugazi1977]

I had to change the collision of the WaterBodyOcean to "OverlapAll" because my Player walked on the water and the floating object didn't work before

[@laylaaly9068]

yes that worked thanks!

[@matheusfreitas9779]

Thanks dude, you helped me a lot! Up

[@asankhan1397]

Hi, can you tell me which key u pressed or how did u bring the island up at 3.04?

[@damonswain2793]

I would love to see one of these water tuts with something other than an island scene. A lake. A waterfall. A coastal city. Every tut I have watched is about islands.

[@2009142]

Can you just do the inverse of an island? Waterfalls would be different though

[@damonswain2793]

I have no idea. That's the reason I ask. I have yet to find a tut that covers this. Last time I tried messing with it, it had recently came out and was still pretty wonky and I really haven't had time to mess with it since unfortunately.

[@VirtusEdu]

This water system does work with lakes and coastal cities, you just have to remember that this system is dependant on landscapes. But so long as you have a landscape this will work. For a lake, use water body lake and you're good to go! This won't work for waterfalls though, for that you will need to build a niagara VFX asset.

[@mundenius]

Awesome video!! Keep up the good work! I have a question tho, I tried adding the ocean to an existing landscape, but it deleted everything and only a small island is there. I moved the splines and found the existing landscape, although there's multiple island in my landscape, so Im wondering if i can just add as many water body oceans as i need to make all my island visible? or if there's an easier way

[@ajesh-wv9ec]

one of the best tutorial for water system

[@VirtusEdu]

[@randomtopology]

Lucky accident on the transition at 22:00 ❤😅 Thank you for the tut

[@peterevans6886]

@Virtus what if someone wants to make a waterfall and does not have the fluid flux?

[@St34mPunkPrivateer]

is it possible to deploy this for a 2d top down game ? or any suggested plugin/tools for a nice 2d

[@smithedits]

How do you add the floating blueprint to sequencer so you also have the animation there, instead of just clicking play?

[@eduardvandijk3431]

My ocean is visible in the viewport but when I try to render a clip in the move render queue the ocean is gone. Any ideas?

[@LukeAventino1975]

Is there a way to map the buoyancy in a way you can control it, let' say I wanted to make a submarine. Thanks for the video!

[@Demonleonardo]

Hello Dude What version you use ？My Buoyancy did not work well in my Unreal Engine 5.0.3

[@myhome8070]

thank you very much

[@fmb009]

thanks!!!

[@maquetesinplace2084]

thank you

[@LordPrutsikas]

great video. My landscape geometry is complex. How can I add more spline points to match my geometry?

[@cadgames1736]

worked for me on my motorolla

[@kevin27gattonero11]

In The setup tNice tutorials was a really helpful video but I'm using soft soft 12, is there a reason why I can't hear my own soft play? I click to play

When I change projects the water configuration changes to the last project, how do I keep the settings in each project, if you can help me.

[@acsomiT]

Very good tutorial. Do you know how I can get rid of the island? I just want infinite water.

[@niltoncostajunior9508]

hi, how to use gerstnerWaves in real time game? for change the waves during gameplay?

[@tomnuscruisnes]

Every single time I struggle when trying to put the river through where my existing spline is for the ocean, I cannot modify the terrain at all outside of the spline for my terrain lol. Any idea what I am botching?

[@8D2BFREE]

Nice tutorial. Can you help me to trouble shoot some things, just point me in the right direction. . I have a asset witch would float in a basic level but in my level with a advanced lake & river setup. it would not float . they look the same using the same core concepts cant figer out where the water is off.

[@daniellal2755]

2:57 how did you generate the island? Am I just suppose to wait for it to load up?

[@KatherineGrantSuttie]

best practices for creating depth of the water? im looking to create a level that is underwater of open ocean - so can't see the ocean floor or near land

[@GarDjinn]

@Virtus Learning Hub everything was fine for couple of weeks then something changed dont know what it is when i place a mesh cube to drop down to the water it dosnt sink it hasnt had bouyancy added yet if i travel far enough from the start area it will sink but wont bouncy when its added help please ps the camera wont go under the water level either

[@max.0196]

Hi, in which way can I move boat with a controller….thanks

[@lorddursh7062]

I'm trying to make completely on water videogame (a thing with a pirate ship) but using this plugin make a big square in the center of the level (i think is landscape place) there is any way to remove that square? i need infinite water only, I'm not using a landscape

[@BrianHuether]

When I add a river I can't use the Foliage editor to paint in foliage. Am I doing something wrong? thanks!

[@Shota83120]

How do i take off this " step " of the body ocean item that is moving above the rest ?

[@RunaUwO]

hi im stuck. im trying to make a under water sea base/complex but idk where to start with it? if i place the base model underwater it will still have water inside. how would i make it so water would only be around the base?

[@vood0_0]

Very nice, just what i was searching these days. Just one question though, if you enter the vessel, would be there water that splits the ship and how do we can build something floating under the water but completly waterproof?

[@christopherarendt3531]

Did you ever find an answer? Wondering the same...

[@pick8695]

Have you tried using a WaterBodyExclusionVolume? I am in the same boat (no pun intended) of wanting a boat without water clipping through, and this feature caught my eye. I have yet to mess with it, but it may useful for exactly this.

[@MrBlackMarkus]

Hi all, need help!) How to make so that the water was deep and it was possible to bathe in it "let's say" or it is necessary to buy 3D models?

[@caturindrasukmana7673]

I follow you instruction but my object doesn't submerged. It just stand on the surface of the ocean. Do you why it happen?

[@techno2776]

Hello, I have a problem with the Water Plugin: UE5 is not not able to "Package Project" as soon the Water Plugin is activated. When I disable it then it works. But I need water🙂 How can I solve it?

[@Preirin]

Thanks for the video! One question: I have a constructed landscape I have imported in from Gaea. When I attempt to add a lake, it pretty much floods my entire landscape. I have tried raising the landscape, etc but that only seems to make things awkward. Is there a way to set the water plane under the landscape manually so I can control the depth/height of my sculpting to get rivers and lakes without flooding? Ta

[@Huskeroni]

If I remember right you can mess with the blend setting to change that. Default should be set to alpha blend, I think (don't quote me on this I'm still quite new) you can use max instead and it wont do that.

[@rocketpoweredchimpgamesphi7798]

Awesome stuff, great for a UE5 newbie (yer, bog off Unity) like me! ;o)

[@mehmetbaspinar25]

my mesh have complex collision and last float pyhsic error my project can u help me pls

[@Playworriors]

when i initiate the water class i see empty space in the ocean i didn't know how to solve it

[@andrewthecook]

Hey there, any idea if the Water System stops most or all of its processing if I click on the eye icon in the Outliner? Or if the lion's share of calculations are done at startup? The reason I ask is I'd like to keep building out my island with the ocean present where I can see it, but if it's gonna eat up excess energy while I do so, I suppose I'd delete it and add it last. What do you think?

[@rodneyunger9783]

Im new to the engine but only thing i can think of right now is maybe make it invisible sorry im not much of a help

[@goshikarakesh8482]

Sir i have problem with rendering, the water body actor is not visible in render view port while rendering but it is visible in sequencer how to solve this issue, i use ue 5.4

[@marcapouli7805]

I've never managed to use buoyancy or water interaction, and I'm not the only one

[@not_zara]

For some reason the lighting for your water is a lot better than mine even though I have material quality set to "epic." basically the lighting on the water for you seems brighter, whereas mine looks too flat/solid. Anything I can do to fix this?

[@SoftYoda]

How would one create single solid static mesh with only a plane (just a plane, no need for any spline/landscape) (as i'm using cesium, i don't need anything else than a plane, i've tried changing the material but it's not working as it was before, i don't know where to search as forums are bad, discord are lost in limbs, and no stackoverflow for unreal engine...

[@daryaxoshnaw7082]

If I can't get tNice tutorials soft, the other option is to purchase a keyboard with the softs already installed [Roland VR-09]. If I have to go tNice tutorials

[@K1N3RGY]

Which version of UE did you do the buoyancy with? Apparently there's a well known bug with this in UE5 that hasn't been fixed. I've used all of the 5.X version's using custom water body and the buoyancy box that's located in the plugins folder and all have the same issue of falling through the water plane. Also tried using the ocean body with no luck.

[@ez8effect]

Same! Did you find out solution?

[@038alpha]

same

[@naytbreeze]

same any fix in 5.3?

[@michaellee4499]

This video is very useful. I also learned the buoyancy settings, but why can't the water in version 5.4 be rendered? The game runs without any problem. Can you please help me solve this problem? This problem has been bothering me for a long time! There is no official response yet!

[@Thisis1melive1withit]

anyone else having the issue where the water acts as a solid surface for objects? messed with collision to fix it and nothings changed

[@Eagle6Airsoft]

Can the water body splines be used with a height map to get a pre made island to a desired shape ? Also how do you add depth to the ocean it’s really shallow ?

[@VirtusEdu]

There's a setting within the water body ocean actor which allows you change the depth and falloff, adjust those and you'll be good to go!

[@Eagle6Airsoft]

@@VirtusEdu thanks, I will give it a try. I got a lot of weirdness when I tried to stretch the splines to make a large island scene. It was like the water vanished. I wasn’t sure whether to make the landscape with height map first then add the ocean and try and adjust the splines to go around it. I was trying to copy a real world location with real data including sizing. I will have a look through your vids and see if you have anything for ue5 and heightmaps and landscapes.

[@GatlingHawk]

@@Eagle6Airsoft im trying to do the same lemme know how it goes

[@RSProduxx]

@@Eagle6Airsoft I have the problem when creating a landscape, using a heightmap on it and then add the water body, it will build water all around that lanscape, but not "flood" it, which I was hoping it would do, so that only the higher regions of the landscape would appear above water line... when I added a blank landscape and sculpted it manually, it worked... dunno what´s wrong, I´m sure I had used a heightmap just fine before...

[@echoless3484]

Could I possibly use this to make Dynamic Sinking Ships? They are supposed to be built by the player and then spawned in so they can play around, is this possible and can they sink?

[@AlbertonBeastmaster]

Objects sink when there is no buoyancy, so maybe expressing buoyancy as a float value and decreasing it in a blueprint?

[@Utopia2023Game2]

awesome

[@VirtusEdu]

You're awesome

[@yes9784]

Hello, beginner here. As soon as I generate the water, the landmass has a mountain that cannot be interacted with, it is not flat. Hope someone can let me know what setting to look at. Thanks

[@nareshkurukooti6659]

I did the same but object is not floating its drowning into the water. I am using waterbodycustom and engine version 5.1

[@windcatcher8510]

Looks really great. However, the water physics still have a long way to go. Splash physics, general movement, viscosity, varying the flow speed of waves in a scene, and dry objects becoming wet after being exposed to water. All of these and more are areas for improvement. For example, the way water drains from the sand once the wave crashes on the beach and washes up and wraps around a surface/rock. Or how water accelerates when it collides with an opposing object or shape.

[@echoless3484]

Oh I hope some of these are added

[@Rohitthakur-dq5uw]

how do i remove the unbound box of water lake

[@CS_Sardine]

If I want water to gradually go up with a timer, as well as allow drowning, what parameters do I need to fiddle with?

[@AlbertonBeastmaster]

Off the top of my head... The overall transform of the water level. For drowning, you would need a boolean check for the player being in water and then have that talking to your health system.

[@lucascavallari8489]

Do you have a tutorial about how to enable swimming?

[@lucascavallari8489]

I managed to start it, but the main problem is he start swimming as soon as he enters shallow water

[@kalex07]

Hi, How do I stop the ocean from deforming my terrain? I un-checked "Affects landscape" which brings back my landscape under the water but the water disappears. Its completely flattened my landscape under the water which means I cant have my underwater biome.

[@jmr2008jan]

Try adding a second landscape with editable layers turned off for your underwater terrain.

[@rouvensoezueer]

Great Tutorial. But last part isnt working for me in 5.1.

[@rehmanurdu]

can we add water splashes of boat?

[@carrapaz3645]

what if i want no island in the middle? just open ocean?

[@160chicken]

I am having issues when it comes to lakes and rivers when using a heightmap for the terrain, with the lake and the river bodies. The bodies of water are invisible , the ocean water body works fine though.

[@Mr_Tea_Rexx]

sadly cause its in experimental its not finished and is extremely buggy. they slowed down the development of this for other areas so dont expect a full finished plugin

[@sudanemamimikiki1527]

cant change my water color. the absorbtion and what not are disabled and enabling them just completely breaks the water. also for some reason my lakes have WAYYY too big waves....

[@somelittlething6620]

Hey. I have a problem. My object just stand on surface water. On the "collision Presets" option, which should i choose.

[@user-yi9pq9sl6z]

Hello bro same problem did u found any solution??

[@somelittlething6620]

Yes, In the boat i choose the "physicActor" preset and with the waterbodyocen make sure the collision presets is "WaterBodyCollision"@@user-yi9pq9sl6z

[@jimishatk9982]

Hi, I tried this but I faced an issue. When I'm trying to float the object it's not even sinking, I enabled simulate physics. But it's still the same. Is there any change I have to make in water details also, plz reply

[@laylaaly9068]

docfugazi1977 3 weeks ago "I had to change the collision of the WaterBodyOcean to "OverlapAll" because my Player walked on the water and the floating object didn't work before" This worked for me!

[@pollutedmindmusic]

after adjusting with the white dots i made walls and a roof out of water, not sure how that happened but i think im cool with it, I Am Become Dev Destroyer of Physics

[@PhilAsar]

One question, for the objects to float, do I have to create an ocean or a river? I have created a pool and I used "water body custom" but the objects do not float, any solution? thank you

[@DRYBREAD_games]

hi you figured it out?

[@PhilAsar]

@@DRYBREAD_games no

[@3dbrasiltutorials495]

How to fix the problem that my character stays on the top of the water?

[@hotbergina]

unique id for accessing unreal (wave) data in gpu buffer.... i have this message when i try to change the velocity of the waves... ( i dont have access to the settings)

[@KidJohnny1337]

You have to preselect the spline curve not the river for the settings (width, velocity ...). Took me a while to figure that out...

[@settocoolb7566]

I can walk on the water, so can all of the items I have, please help me

[@EmaSans-tu5eg]

why when I try to do the package I got an error