Group Manager

A smarter way to manage scene and global groups in the Godot editor.

Group Manager replaces the friction of Godot's built-in Groups dock with a purpose-built panel that gives you full visibility into every group in your scene, lets you assign nodes with a single checkbox, and keeps your workflow uninterrupted with live search, undo/redo support, and a dockable UI you can place wherever you want.

Installation

From the downloaded ZIP

1. Download and extract the ZIP archive.
2. Copy the addons/group_manager folder into your project's addons/ directory. If your project does not already have an addons/ folder, create one at the project root (next to project.godot). The final path should be:

   your_project/
   └── addons/
       └── group_manager/
           ├── plugin.cfg
           ├── plugin.gd
           └── group_manager_dock.gd
   

3. Open the editor and go to Project → Project Settings → Plugins.
4. Find Group Manager in the list and toggle Enable.
5. The Groups panel appears in the bottom bar, alongside Output and Debugger. Use the location dropdown in the panel's toolbar to move it if you prefer a side dock.

From the Godot Asset Library

1. In the editor, open the AssetLib tab at the top of the window.
2. Search for Group Manager and open its page.
3. Click Download, then Install — the installer places the files under addons/group_manager automatically.
4. Enable the plugin via Project → Project Settings → Plugins as described above.

Verifying it works

Once enabled, open any scene and click the Groups tab in the bottom panel. If the scene has nodes assigned to groups, they appear immediately. If not, the panel shows "No groups found" until you create one with the + Group button.

Features

Scene and global groups, side by side Groups are split into two clearly labelled sections — Scene Groups and Global Groups — so you always know the scope of what you're working with. Global groups registered in Project Settings show a global badge and are visible across every scene in your project.

Create groups with scope control The New Group dialog lets you choose between Scene or Global scope at creation time. Global groups are written directly to project.godot via ProjectSettings and appear in Project Settings → Globals → Groups immediately. No need to navigate away from your scene.

Fuzzy search at two levels A group filter bar at the top narrows the group list as you type using fuzzy matching — type plr to find player_group. Expand any group and a second search bar filters its node list the same way, with matched characters highlighted in amber so you can see exactly what matched.

Checkbox node membership Expand any group to see every node in the scene with a checkbox. Checked nodes are members. Members always sort to the top with their node type icon shown alongside their name. Uncheck to remove — the group stays listed even with zero members.

Empty groups that persist Godot discards groups the moment their last member is removed. Group Manager saves all explicitly created scene groups to a lightweight .gm_groups file next to your scene, so empty groups survive scene reloads and editor restarts.

Full undo/redo integration Every membership change, group rename, and group deletion is registered with EditorUndoRedoManager. Ctrl+Z works exactly as expected, including across scene history.

Flexible dock placement A dropdown in the toolbar lets you move the panel between five locations without restarting the editor: Bottom Panel, Left (Upper), Left (Lower), Right (Upper), and Right (Lower). Your choice is saved to EditorSettings and restored on next launch.

Usage

Create a group — Click + Group, enter a name, and choose Scene or Global scope. Global scope reveals an optional description field that is stored alongside the group in Project Settings.

Assign nodes — Click the ▶ arrow on any group row to expand it. Every node in the current scene is listed with a checkbox. Check a node to add it to the group; uncheck to remove it. Current members sort to the top.

Rename a group — Click the ✎ icon on a group row. Scene groups update in the .gm_groups file; global groups have their Project Settings key moved and their description preserved. Any live node members are re-tagged automatically.

Delete a group — Click the ✕ icon. For global groups, this removes the entry from Project Settings as well as from any nodes in the current scene. The confirmation dialog states clearly when you are deleting a project-wide global group.

Search — Use the top filter bar to narrow the group list, or the per-group search bar (visible when a group is expanded) to filter its node list. Both use fuzzy matching.

Move the dock — Use the location dropdown in the toolbar to reposition the panel at any time.

Requirements

• Godot 4.2 or later.
• Node type icons require Godot 4.3 or later. On 4.2 the plugin runs normally but node rows show without their type icons, because EditorInterface.get_editor_theme() was introduced in 4.3. The call is guarded, so no error occurs on 4.2.

Tested against Godot 4.7 stable (released June 18, 2026).

Notes on version control

Scene groups created via Group Manager are saved to a .gm_groups file alongside your .tscn. It is safe to commit this file to version control — collaborators will see the same pre-declared empty groups. If you prefer to keep it local, add the following line to your .gitignore:

*.gm_groups

Global groups are written to project.godot under the [global_group] section and behave identically to groups created through the built-in Project Settings interface. Since project.godot is normally committed, global groups are shared with your team automatically.

Troubleshooting

The Groups panel does not appear after enabling. Godot occasionally caches dock layout. Disable the plugin, restart the editor, then re-enable it. If it still does not show, use Editor → Editor Layout → Reset to Default Layout.

A global group I created in Project Settings is not shown. Click the refresh button (↺) in the toolbar. The panel reads global groups from the live ProjectSettings and from project.godot on disk; a refresh re-scans both.

Node icons are missing. This is expected on Godot 4.2. Upgrade to 4.3 or later to see node type icons.

License

See the LICENSE file included with this plugin.

Made by Accessive Game Studio