Azure ACI (Experimental)

Run Unity builds as Azure Container Instances - serverless containers with configurable storage backends.

Experimental

This provider is experimental. APIs and behavior may change between releases.

Prerequisites

• Azure CLI installed and authenticated (az login or service principal)
• A resource group (auto-created if it doesn't exist)
• Contributor role on the resource group

Storage Types

Set azureStorageType to control how the build accesses large files.

Type	How it works	Best for	Size limit
azure-files	Mounts an Azure File Share via SMB	General artifact storage	100 TiB
blob-copy	Copies artifacts in/out via az storage blob	Simple upload/download	Unlimited
azure-files-nfs	Mounts an Azure File Share via NFS 4.1	Unity Library (small random reads)	100 TiB
in-memory	emptyDir volume (tmpfs)	Scratch/temp during builds	Container memory

When to use each type

• azure-files (default) - Simplest persistent option. Works out of the box - auto-creates the storage account and file share if they don't exist. SMB has some overhead from opportunistic locking but is reliable for most use cases.

• blob-copy - Avoids mount overhead entirely. Copies everything before the build starts and uploads after it finishes. Good when you only need artifact upload/download.

• azure-files-nfs - Eliminates SMB lock overhead for better random I/O performance with Unity Library files (thousands of small files). Requires Premium FileStorage (auto-created) and VNet integration via azureSubnetId.

• in-memory - Fastest option (RAM-backed). Data is lost when the container stops. Size is limited by the container's memory allocation. Use for temporary build artifacts.

Inputs

Input	Default	Description
azureResourceGroup	$AZURE_RESOURCE_GROUP	Resource group name
azureLocation	eastus	Azure region
azureStorageType	azure-files	Storage backend (see above)
azureStorageAccount	$AZURE_STORAGE_ACCOUNT	Storage account name
azureBlobContainer	unity-builds	Blob container (for blob-copy)
azureFileShareName	unity-builds	File share name (for azure-files, azure-files-nfs)
azureSubscriptionId	$AZURE_SUBSCRIPTION_ID	Subscription ID
azureCpu	4	CPU cores (1–16)
azureMemoryGb	16	Memory in GB (1–16)
azureDiskSizeGb	100	File share quota in GB
azureSubnetId	-	Subnet ID for VNet (required for azure-files-nfs)

Examples

Azure Files - SMB mount (default)

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    providerStrategy: azure-aci
    azureResourceGroup: my-rg
    azureStorageAccount: myunitybuilds
    targetPlatform: StandaloneLinux64

NFS - better POSIX performance

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    providerStrategy: azure-aci
    azureResourceGroup: my-rg
    azureStorageType: azure-files-nfs
    azureStorageAccount: myunitybuilds
    azureSubnetId: /subscriptions/.../subnets/default
    targetPlatform: StandaloneLinux64

Blob copy - simple artifact upload/download

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    providerStrategy: azure-aci
    azureResourceGroup: my-rg
    azureStorageType: blob-copy
    azureStorageAccount: myunitybuilds
    azureBlobContainer: my-builds
    targetPlatform: StandaloneLinux64

Related

• GCP Cloud Run - Google Cloud Run Jobs provider
• Custom Providers - TypeScript provider plugins
• CLI Provider Protocol - Write providers in any language