Epic Games Launcher shows 0 Unreal Engine entitlements — Install Engine and + do nothing

General Issues and Bug Reporting (Unreal Engine)
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1

Summary

Hi,

I am unable to install Unreal Engine through the Epic Games Launcher.

The Unreal Engine > Library page shows no engine versions at all. Clicking either “Install Engine” or the “+” button does nothing.

I have already tried:

  • Restarting the Epic Games Launcher
  • Running the Launcher as Administrator
  • Clearing the Epic Games Launcher web cache
  • Signing out and back into the same Epic account
  • Verifying that Visual Studio 2022 and the C++/MSVC build tools are installed

The important part of the Epic Games Launcher log is:

EoshState = WaitingForBuildsAndItemFiles
Loaded 0 item files
found 0 entitled apps

The account is newly created and has no Epic Games Store purchases, but Unreal Engine is free and should still be available.

Epic Games Player Support case #26920790 reviewed the issue and redirected me to Unreal Engine / Epic Developer Support because they do not have access to Unreal Engine entitlement issues.

This appears to be an account/launcher entitlement or build-manifest problem rather than a local Unreal installation problem.

Environment:

  • Windows 11
  • Epic Games Launcher 20.3.x
  • Visual Studio 2022 Community with C++ tools installed
  • No Unreal Engine version is currently installed

Could someone from the Unreal/Epic team please check why this account is receiving 0 entitled apps / 0 item files and why the Unreal Engine versions are not being provided to the Launcher?

Thank you.

What Type of Bug are you experiencing?

Platform Other

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Install and sign in to Epic Games Launcher on Windows 11.
  2. Open Unreal Engine > Library.
  3. Observe that no Engine Versions are listed.
  4. Click “Install Engine”.
  5. Click the “+” button beside Engine Versions.
  6. Neither control produces any response and no Unreal Engine version becomes available.

Expected Result

The Unreal Engine Library should display available Unreal Engine versions, including Unreal Engine 5.8, and clicking “Install Engine” or the “+” button should allow me to select and install an engine version.

Observed Result

The Unreal Engine Library remains empty. “Install Engine” and the “+” button do nothing.

The Epic Games Launcher log reports:
EoshState = WaitingForBuildsAndItemFiles
Loaded 0 item files
found 0 entitled apps

Affects Versions

5.8

Platform(s)

Windows

2

The logs strongly suggest an account entitlement/catalog issue rather than a local installation problem.

The Launcher reports:

Loaded 0 item files
found 0 entitled apps

Could you please check this account’s Unreal Engine entitlement and backend build/catalog assignment and refresh it if necessary?

The Unreal Engine Library is completely empty, and both Install Engine and + do nothing.

Epic Support case: #26920790

3

Same issue here, on a different account and PC.

  • Epic Games Launcher 20.3.4 (fresh reinstall), Windows 10 Pro 22H2
  • “Install Engine” is clickable but does nothing; the version arrow and “+” are greyed out
  • Unreal Engine EULA accepted, signed out and in, launcher run as administrator, web cache cleared, Legacy Launcher tried
  • Launcher log, every start:
EoshState = WaitingForBuildsAndItemFiles
LoadItemFiles: Loaded 0 item files
...found 0 entitled apps

Epic Games Player Support case #26910499 closed it and redirected me here, as with case #26920790 above. It looks like the account is not getting the Unreal Engine entitlement at all. Could someone from Epic check the entitlement on the account side?

4

20 days later still a problem.

Took nearly 14 hours to compile in Visual Studio instead.

Kinda wild

5

Same problem here on Windows 11 Pro (25H2) with Launcher 20.3.6. The Launcher logged “found 0 entitled apps” at every sign-in, Engine Versions was empty, Install Engine / + was greyed out, and a Fab project download sat on “Initializing”. Signing out and in, clearing the webcache, toggling Hide Game Library and a normal reinstall didn’t help. The same account worked fine on another PC on the same network, so the cause was something on this machine.

What fixed it for me:

  1. Uninstalled Epic Games Launcher and Epic Online Services (Settings > Apps).
  2. Exported a backup of the registry, then renamed every Epic key I could find to .old, including HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Epic Games and the EpicGames keys under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE.
  3. Renamed every Epic folder that existed to .old: C:\Program Files\Epic Games, C:\Program Files (x86)\Epic Games, C:\ProgramData\Epic, C:\ProgramData\EpicInstallerTemp, and in %LOCALAPPDATA%: Epic, Epic Games, EpicGamesLauncher, UnrealEngineLauncher.
  4. Restarted Windows. A Windows update also installed during that restart.
  5. Installed the Launcher from a fresh download and signed in.

Shortly after that, the library showed the engine versions again and my queued Lyra download completed. I can’t say which single step did it, because the restart and the Windows update happened together. A plain reinstall without steps 2–4 did not work for me.

If you also use a source-built engine: renaming HKCU\Software\Epic Games also removes its registration under Unreal Engine\Builds, so back that up and restore it afterwards.

6

Workaround that worked for me:

I had the same issue (empty Engine Versions, “+” greyed out, log: found 0 entitled apps). Here’s what fixed it:

  1. Go to Unreal Engine → Samples in the launcher.
  2. Add Game Animation Sample to your library (free).
  3. Try to create/open a project from it. You’ll get an error saying the required engine isn’t installed.
  4. Go back to Library: the Install Engine and + buttons now work, and I could install the engine normally.

Looks like interacting with a sample forces the launcher to refresh the engine catalog/entitlement. Hope this helps someone!