ESX Legacy FAQ
Answers to the most common ESX Legacy questions - installation, current version, OneSync, oxmysql, admin rights, giving money, adding items and getting xPlayer.
Quick answers to the questions people ask most about ESX Legacy. The answers above are short on purpose; the links below lead to the pages with full explanations, examples and edge cases.
Installing and updating
- Install with txAdmin in about 15 minutes: Installation
- Install without txAdmin, or understand what the recipe does: Manual installation
- Every
server.cfgline explained, including OneSync and the database string: server.cfg - Update to a new release without losing data: Updating
- Fix a specific error message: Troubleshooting
Running a server
- Admin groups, ACE permissions and custom groups: Admin permissions
- Built-in commands such as
/giveaccountmoney,/setjoband/car: Commands - Accounts, starting money and how money is stored: Money and accounts
- Adding items to the default inventory: Add items
- Switching to ox_inventory: ox_inventory guide
- Creating jobs with grades and salaries: Create a job
- Characters and slots: esx_multicharacter
Writing scripts
- A complete first resource with a command and a callback: Your first ESX resource
- Every method of the player object: xPlayer
- Client and server callbacks: Callbacks
- Database queries with oxmysql: oxmysql guide
- Updating scripts written for old ESX: Convert old ESX scripts
Choosing a framework
ESX and QBCore solve the same problem in different ways. Our ESX vs QBCore comparison covers the player object, inventory, ecosystem and how hard it is to move scripts between the two.
About this site
esx-fivem.com is an independent community documentation and is not affiliated with the ESX team. For official announcements and support, use the official documentation, the ESX GitHub and the official Discord. Read more in the introduction.
Frequently asked questions
The easiest way is the ESX Legacy recipe in txAdmin. Start a current FiveM server build, choose Popular Recipes, select ESX Legacy, enter your database credentials and license key, and txAdmin installs everything. You can also install it manually by importing legacy.sql and starting oxmysql, esx_lib, es_extended and the [core] resources.
Yes. ESX Legacy is open source and free to use. The core is licensed under GPL-3.0 and published on github.com/esx-framework. Many third-party scripts for ESX are paid, but the framework itself is not.
ESX Legacy 1.16.4 is the current release as of October 2026. Releases and changelogs are on github.com/esx-framework/esx_core/releases.
Both are mature roleplay frameworks. ESX has the longer history and the largest catalog of existing scripts, and its API is centered on the xPlayer object. QBCore uses a different player object and its own ecosystem. Pick the one your scripts and developers already target, because scripts are not directly interchangeable.
Yes. ESX Legacy requires OneSync Infinity (set onesync on). Players are refused with "ESX Requires Onesync Infinity to work" when OneSync is off or set to legacy.
Use oxmysql. ESX Legacy depends on oxmysql and loads its Lua library directly, so mysql-async is not needed. Scripts written for mysql-async should be converted to the oxmysql API.
Add add_principal identifier.license:YOUR_LICENSE group.admin to server.cfg, keep the add_ace lines for group.admin and resource.es_extended, then restart. New characters get the admin group automatically; for an existing character run setgroup YOUR_ID admin in the server console.
As an admin use /giveaccountmoney ID ACCOUNT AMOUNT, for example /giveaccountmoney 1 bank 5000. Valid accounts are money, bank and black_money. In code, call xPlayer.addAccountMoney('bank', 5000, 'reason') on the server.
With the default inventory, insert a row into the items table (name, label, weight), then run /refreshitems or restart the server. With ox_inventory, add the item to ox_inventory's item data file instead.
On the server call ESX.GetPlayerFromId(source). It returns nil if the player has not loaded a character yet, so always check the result before using it.
Add setr esx:locale "de" (or another locale code) to server.cfg and restart. Without it, ESX uses the language selected in txAdmin and falls back to English.
The resource does not load '@es_extended/imports.lua' in its fxmanifest.lua, or it starts before es_extended. Add the import to shared_scripts and move the resource below es_extended in server.cfg.
Yes. es_extended detects ox_inventory automatically when it is installed and switches to it. Do not change Config.CustomInventory by hand for ox_inventory.
Many do, because ESX Legacy kept most of the old API. Scripts that use the esx:getSharedObject event, mysql-async or removed functions need small changes. See the conversion guide.
Independent documentation
esx-fivem.com is a community project and is not affiliated with the ESX Framework team. Facts on this page were checked against the upstream source. Official resources: docs.esx-framework.org and github.com/esx-framework.
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