This tutorial will guide you through getting started with Meta Haptics Studio, Meta’s tool for designing, testing, and refining haptic feedback for VR applications. It will cover how to download the software, pair your headset, analyze audio, and create custom haptic interactions. By the end of the tutorial, you’ll have a working understanding of Meta Haptics Studio’s core features and a small library of custom-designed haptics ready to use in your own VR projects.

CREATING A PROJECT

1. On the home screen of the Haptics Studio Desktop app, click ‘New project’, or choose an existing template to test.

2. Drag and drop audio files (.wav, .ogg, .mp3) into the editor. You can download exmaple audio clips from the Oculus Audio Pack. The Haptics Studio desktop app will automatically analyze your audio clip and generate haptic effects.
   
   

You can now begin exploring the different features of haptic studio, and fine tune your haptic experiences!

sample PROJECT walkthrough: footsteps

This walkrhtough will help you explore how to use Meta Haptics Studio to design distinct haptic feedback for different types of footsteps, on concrete, grass, and metal. You’ll learn how to shape tactile sensations using tools like amplitude, resolution, emphasis, and frequency mapping.

Through this activity, you’ll gain experience with analyzing audio clips, adjusting haptic output ranges, and balancing different textures so that each surface feels unique and intentional. By the end, you’ll have a set of three footstep haptics that reflect different materials.

SETUP

In Meta Haptics Studio (on your desktop):

1. Open or create a new project.

2. Use File → Import Folder to bring in a folder of audio files, or manually drag and drop the following audio files from the Oculus Audio Pack into your project

   • 1. foosteps_shoe_metal_land_01

     2. foosteps_shoe_grass_land_01

     3. foosteps_shoe_concrete_land_01

3. If the audio analysis does not happen automatically, select each clip and click Run Audio Analysis. You’ll see generated Amplitude and Frequency envelopes. (If this option doesn't appear, the analysis has likely already happened)

4. After making edits to an audio clip, you can audition it directly on your headset controllers via the companion app, provided you save your changes.

Metal FootstEps

A metal footstep should feel sharp, ringing, and heavy, like stepping onto a steel grate or catwalk. This terrain is likely to stand out most, so you may use it as a benchmark for “max intensity” and scale others around it.

To achieve this, try editing the following features on the rightside panel for the foosteps_shoe_metal_land_01 audio clip.

• Amplitude Gain: High. 

  • • The initial clang should feel dramatic. Try experimenting with ranges between 4-8 dB. 

    • You can also try manually editing breakpoints to adjust amplitude in particular sections, such as increasing the amplitude for the initial strike, or creating a starker contrast by reducing amplitude elsewhere. 

• Resolution: High. 

  • • Metal’s ringing decay and layered harmonics often require high resolution. Try experimenting with a 45-55 bp/s range.

• Emphasis Sensitivity: High. 

  • • Use this to boost the strike. Try a 70-90% range.

    • You can also manually add emphasis near onset and again just after to simulate the initial impact and subtle resonance. You can  do this by dragging the green colored breakpoints up or down, to increase or decrease emphasis, respectively.

• Audio Filter: 700Hz–2000Hz. 

  • • This range lets you focus on the upper harmonics typical of metallic objects. Cut the lows aggressively unless you want to simulate heavy plate reverb.

• Haptic Output Range: 75–95%. 

  • • Metal conveys resonance, sharpness, and weight, which sit naturally in the upper-middle percentiles. Higher frequencies here simulate sharper, tinnier textures. Lowering the output would make it feel “heavier,” but you’ll lose detail.

    • Go toward 100% for a clanging, tinny bite

    • Pull back to ~50% if it feels overwhelming or distracts from other events

GrASS FootstEps

Grass is quiet and absorbent, so a light, shallow frequency mapping and gentle gain avoids overdramatizing it. You can use subtle friction, light compression, and softer amplitudes to mimic a grassy feeling.

To achieve this, try editing the following features on the rightside panel for the foosteps_shoe_grass_land_01 audio clip.

• Amplitude Gain: Low to medium. 

  1. • You’re aiming for gentle presence (but not silence!). Experiment with ranges between -2 to -10 dB.

     • Raise gain if the feel completely vanishes, and lower it if it distracts.

• Resolution: Low to medium. 

  1. • Grass doesn’t have sharp textures, so avoid over-detailing. A higher resolution here may end up creating an artificial “static” sensation.  Experiment with a 5–30 bp/s range.

• Emphasis Sensitivity: Low. 

  1. • You likely don’t need strong transients unless your clip contains a distinct "crack" of a twig. Use no manual emphasis unless you want to highlight an unexpected crunch.  Try a 5–30% range.

• Audio Filter: 600Hz–2000Hz. 

  1. • This range will help you in targeting a light rustle feel. 

     • Lower ranges could introduce unwanted rumble, and upper ranges mimic rustling leaves.  

• Haptic Output Range: 15–35%. 

  1. • Use a lower range to feel interactions that are more diffused and gentle. 

     • If you go too low, the vibration may become inaudible, so you may have to experiment with bumping up the amplitude gain or the haptic output range for hardware visibility.

CONCRETE FootstEps

Concrete isn’t resonant, but it is sharp. Try to change the settings to simulate firmness and high-friction contact, so the haptics feel like something with solid, abrupt contact. 

To achieve this, try editing the following features on the rightside panel for the foosteps_shoe_concrete_land_01 audio clip.

• Amplitude Gain: Medium to high. 

  1. • This reflects the force of contact with a rigid surface. Experiment with a 0 to 5 dB range.

     • If this feels overwhelming or distracts from other environmental cues, lower the gain, but if it feels like a carpet, raise the gain.  

• Resolution: High. 

  1. • Concrete surfaces have a lot of micro-vibrations when impacted, with a rough feeling created by gravel bits. Higher resolution is able to capture this texture more effectively, so try experimenting with a 40–55 bp/s range. 

     • If it starts to feel staticky or noisy, reduce the resolution.  

• Emphasis Sensitivity: Medium. 

  1. • Boosting the sensitivity at the initial strike can help create a stronger feeling of initial contact. Try experimenting with a 70–100% range.

     • You may want to adding manual emphasis at the start for finer control.  

• Audio Filter: 400Hz–1000Hz. 

  1. • This range will help filter out bassy rumbles, focusing on crisper sounds in the middle range clarity. 

     • If your clip feels too dull, try expanding the upper bound.  

• Haptic Output Range: 35–55%. 

  1. • A tight, mid-frequency tactile feel will help you capture firmness without feeling too deep (muddy) or too high (buzzy). This will help achieve a drier, more rigid feel.

     • You can also try using a lower range to feel interactions that are more diffused and gentle. 

Additional tiPS

As you start fine-tuning your clips, here are some helpful editing features in Meta Haptics Studio that give you more control over the shape and feel of your haptics.

• Manually Adjust Breakpoints: You can directly modify the amplitude, frequency, and emphasis curves by clicking and dragging individual breakpoints in the editor. This gives you precise control over how the vibration rises and falls at specific moments in the clip.

• Zoom and Navigate the Timeline: If your clip is long or you want to focus on a specific moment, you can zoom in or out of the timeline via the lower audio display, as well as pan across the clip.

• Select and Edit Multiple Points: To make broader changes, you can click and drag to select multiple breakpoints. Once selected, you can move them as a group, either vertically (to change amplitude) or horizontally (to shift timing). This is useful when you want to shift an entire section earlier or later in the clip, or uniformly raise/lower a region’s intensity.

• Combine Manual and Automatic Editing: You can always start with an auto-generated analysis and then refine individual points manually for more nuanced control. Just keep in mind that if you re-run analysis after editing, it will overwrite your manual changes, so do your fine-tuning last.

Exporting haptic clips

1. Select the clip(s) you want to export in the clip list on the left.

2. Go to File > Export Selected or click the ‘Export’ Button at the bottom of the clip list.

3. Choose your file format:

   • • For Unity or Unreal Engine integration: Select .haptic.

     • For iOS integration: Select .ahap. Your clip will be exported as two files: TRANSIENTS.AHAP and CONTINUOUS.AHAP. You can refer to the Apple Developer Documentation for more information.

     • For other platforms, select waveform (.wav).

Further Resources and Tutorials

• Haptics Studio Public Release: https://developers.meta.com/horizon/blog/haptics-public-release-enhance-your-immersive-experiences-on-meta-quest/

• Haptics SDK for Unity Documentation: https://developers.meta.com/horizon/documentation/unity/unity-haptics-sdk/ 

• Haptics Studio Basics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsJRVtlWFOc 

• Meta Haptics Studio and Haptics SDK Walkthrough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUUwWMkXFt0 

• Haptics Studio Workflow and Design: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQLU9TRv3fI 

• Haptic Studio with Unity Integration Tutorials

  • • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUUwWMkXFt0

    • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qr-k3swrLQE 

• Getting Started with Haptics Studio (Documentation): https://developers.meta.com/horizon/documentation/unity/unity-haptics-studio-get-started/