Blender Asset Browser not working? This is the cure – How to Make it Work Every Time

The Asset browser in Blender is an amazingly powerful tool. But it can be frustrating when the Blender asset browser is not working.

The good news is that there are several things that you can do to fix the problem and make it work smoothly every time you start a new project.

Lets address the problem

Firstly, its important to acknowledge that often when something isn’t working, it’s because we are missing a step in our workflow or we just haven’t set the tool up correctly.

I am just as guilty of this as the next person.

I will often discover an amazing blender tool and want to jump straight in and start using it.

There is nothing wrong with learning like this, it’s actually a great way to learn Blender.

I find that when I learn this way, I hit roadblocks really quickly.

This sounds like a bad thing but its not.

Once I hit a roadblock, I then go searching for the relevant information to solve the problem as fast as I can.

And then next time I hit the roadblock my brain remembers the solution.

So if what should you do if the Blender asset browser is not working?

What is the Blender Asset Browser

First of all, let’s do a quick recap of what the Asset Browser is and what you can use it for.

Skip to the ‘common problems’ section if you don’t need the recap.

Blender asset browser is a powerful tool which allows you to create a library of reusable assets including objects, materials and worlds.

The asset browser makes your workflow quicker, easier and more of a visual process.

It has handy drag-and-drop features to drag objects and materials into your viewport.

The full details of the asset browser are of course in the blender manual located here.

And details are available on the releases page here, all you need to do is scroll down until you hit the heading that says ‘asset browser’.

Correct set up of the asset browser if the Blender asset browser is not working

The first thing you probably did when you heard about this asset browser was to split your viewport in blender to create a new editor window, selected the asset browser from the ‘editor type’ menu and you ended up with a screen that looked like this:

And now you are wondering what to do now? Where are your assets? How do you create them? How do you use them between projects?

Well this article will cover all of these things, skip to the relevant section below:

1. Define your asset folder
2. Set the file path
3. Define your assets
4. Create asset catalogues
5. Select your asset library
6. Select your asset catalogue
7. Common problems and how to fix them

1. Define your asset folders

The first thing to do when setting up your asset browser is to create a folder (or folders) on your computer to put your assets in.

Then you need to tell blender where this folder is (you need to map the file path to the folder).

So lets do those steps now.

In order to define your asset folder, you can create a new folder on your computer or just use an existing folder.

To create a new asset folder, just create a folder in your ’documents’ on your PC, call it anything you like, call it ‘pink fish frogs’ for all I care, seriously it doesn’t matter to Blender.

2. Set the File Path

The next step is to tell blender where this folder is, i.e. map the folder within blender. This is a very common mistake that people make when they think that the Blender Asset browser is not working.

To map this drive follow these steps:

• Open Blender
• Go to ’edit’ menu at the top left of screen
• Scroll to the bottom to ’preferences’
• Scroll to the bottom of the preference menu where it says ‘file paths’
• Under this menu there is a drop down section called ’Asset libraries’
• If you expand this section it will look like this:

If you click on the plus (‘+’) button you can add a file path.

After clicking the plus icon, navigate to your asset folder on your computer and then click ‘add asset library’, see the file path at the top of the screen, this is where you will see your file path once you’ve navigated to your asset folder.

Name your asset library

You will need to give your asset library a name in order for the file path to be mapped, in this case I called it ‘Tiny Happy Assets’. Please note that the name of the asset library doesn’t have to be the name of the folder you’ve navigated to.

I know that this seems confusing but see the image below.

I’ve navigated to a folder on my computer called ‘Assets’ and then given this asset library the name of ‘Tiny Happy Assets’.

Look at it this way, by entering your file path you are simply telling blender where the asset library is stored. Blender won’t automatically pull the name of the folder that you’ve navigated to.

Once you’ve named your asset library you need to come out of the preferences menu and go back to the asset browser in your normal viewport window.

You should now see your newly created asset browser folder within the asset browser drop down menu, as shown below, here you can see my asset library called ‘Tiny Happy Assets’ and see the file path showing where that library is located on my computer.

Great, you’ve set up your first asset library and mapped the file path to it. Now you can start using the asset browser right?

Not quite, if you have created a brand new folder to use as your asset library then there won’t be any assets in your asset library yet.

You still won’t see any assets in the viewport, it will be blank.

This is a common place where people get stuck and assuming that the Blender asset browser is not working. I’ve covered how to ‘fix’ this issue in section 7.

Let’s move on to defining your assets.

3. Define your Assets

To define assets within blender is very easy.

Lets illustrate with an example, I have created a cube to use as an example (original I know).

If we look in our outliner we can see all of the data blocks (objects, materials etc) that we have in our current file.

If we want to define any of these as an asset, we simply select the object or material , right click and ‘mark as asset’.

After we have done this, this object or material will now show up in our asset library, yay finally! See below:

Before you get too excited, there are still a few things to do before you can use this asset.

You will notice that the cube ‘asset’ only shows up in the ’current file’ asset library.

It is not yet linked to your newly created ‘asset library’.

This asset won’t show up in your libraries until you’ve saved your blend file into the asset library folder on your computer.

A simple ‘save as’ will solve this problem.

4. Create Asset Catalogues

So you have created a few assets and saved them into asset libraries.

You now want to start arranging them into some sort of order.

This will help your workflow and also keep things tidy.

Catalogues are blenders way of subdividing your assets.

You can create new catalogues by clicking the little plus (+) icon next to the ‘All’ catalogue field. (Highlighted in blue in the image above).

Your newly created catalogue will have an asterisk * next to it until you have saved the current file.

Note that you can only add assets into catalogues in the file that you are working in.

And an asset can only be added to one catalogue at a time.

If you created an asset in another blend file, you have to go back into that file in order to move that asset around. This is a pain and I hope the developers fix this in the future.

5. Select Your Asset Library

Great, so you’ve created some assets, added them to catalogues and want to use them in a new file.

To do this, you simply have to select the asset library you want to pull your asset from.

Now select the catalogue that you want to pull the asset from.

And simply drag and drop it into your viewport to start working with it.

If you drag an object into the viewport and want to add a material asset to it.

Simply drag and drop the material onto the object and it will be assigned.

Of course you will have to adjust your UV map for this material.

6. Common problems & easy fixes for when the asset browser is not working

Whether or not you’ve followed steps 1-5 above, you may still run into problems with your asset browser from time to time.

I have outlined below a few common problems with the blender asset browser and how to quickly fix them.

6.1 Blender Asset Browser isn’t showing any libraries

If you cannot see any libraries in your asset browser then you need to map your file path again. You may see a message like this:

This happens when you have moved or changed the name of the asset folder on your computer. Go back to step 1 and map your file path for your asset folder again.

6.2 My asset browser is empty

So you’ve set up your asset browser with the correct file path selected.

But your file browser still looks like this when you start a new file or open an existing file to try and import a saved asset:

This is a really easy fix

See the little drop down menu at the top of the asset browser that looks like this:

If you have opened a new file or an existing file and you cant see any assets, that’s because you haven’t marked any assets in that file yet.

You still have a library of assets (if you’ve previously created them), they haven’t disappeared.

You just have to change the selection in your drop down menu, see below:

Click the video below to see my asset browser go from empty to full of saved assets

In this example I just downloaded some free assets from Kitbash3D and dropped them into my asset library.

If you haven’t heard of them before, you should check them out.

They sell amazing asset packs that you can use to kit-bash or build incredible art in blender. They have a free download here.

6.3 Blender asset browser not working – My asset is not showing in my asset library

You might think that the Blender asset browser is not working if you don’t see your asset show up in your asset library.

However, for an asset to show in an asset library you need to put the blend file it was created in into the asset library folder on your computer.

You need to make the choice whether the put the actual file in there or a copy of it, because this will have knock on effects for your workflow and existing folder structure.

This is something which annoys me about the asset browser.

I hope there is a better solution for this in the next release.

For now its just something that you have to make the best of.

Quick note on this, be careful of putting the original blend files into the asset browser folder. If you delete an asset from the original blend file then its deleted completely, gone for good.

Keeping a copy is always sensible, then you will always have a copy to fall back on.

6.4 I can’t figure out which file I marked the asset in. Help!

I can be confusing and irritating to have to go back to the blend file in which you originally marked an asset.

So how do you keep track of where your assets are located?

There is a secret trick that Blender has to help you out with this one.

Open the asset browser.

Select a material by clicking on it.

Hit ‘N’ on your keyboard and it will bring up the Asset Browser Details Region.

Here you can see a entry for ‘source’, this tells you where the asset is located.

If it was originally marked in the current file it will display ‘current file’.

If you marked the asset in another blend file , then you will see the file path in this field.

And if you want to go to the file shown in the file path.

Then you can click the ‘spanners’ icon.

This will open the blend file that the asset is located in.

So there we go, we are done.

We’ve covered the most common problems with the Blender asset browser, and provided solutions to fix them.

You can now go and create amazing assets that you can reuse over and over again in your work.

If you got value out of this article then please subscribe. I will send you weekly tips and tricks for creating amazing art in blender.