Testing your place

Play runs a real server and a real client inside Studio.

The two starts

The pair is the real thing. The server half runs the same simulation a dedicated Aero server runs, and the client half sends input through the same networking a player's client uses, connected over a loopback this machine makes to itself.

In Play, the viewport shows the client's half: the world as your player receives it. In Run, it shows the server's tree.

Snapshots and Reset

Both starts take a snapshot of the place first, so the place you edit is never the one being simulated. Reset (Shift+F5) ends the test and puts the place back exactly as it was; edits made during a test are discarded.

If the place has unsaved changes, Studio saves it before the test starts. That setting is on the Autosave page under Edit > Settings, and it is on by default.

Pause and Step

Pause (F7) freezes the simulation. While paused, the viewport shows the server's half of the test, and Step (F8) advances the world by one frame.

Both halves in one Output

Prints and errors from the two halves land in the same Output panel, so a server script and a client script can be watched together while the test runs.

For timings, one report covers both sides:

game:GetService("Perf"):Report()

The report names the server's scripts, physics, and replication stages, then the client's camera, scripts, replication, and prediction. See Perf.

The Store sidecar plays along too: a test reads the place's saved values and writes to a temporary copy, so playtesting never changes the real save.

Where to go next

• Perf: reading the report.
• Troubleshooting: when the test stops at a red line.
• Studio Tour: the rest of the toolbar.