WebVR becomes WebXR, incorporating Augmented Reality (AR) and Mixed Reality (MR)
Great news for the WebVR community! As of Dec 2017, a new standard is being finalized (including recognition by W3C) that extends the WebVR JavaScript API to include Augmented Reality (AR) and Mixed Reality (MR). While there is already some support for this (WebVR works fine with Windows Mixed Reality Headsets, for example) the formal setting of standards is a great leap forward.
To promote the new standard, Mozilla of Firefox fame has released a WebXR viewer as a downloadable app for iOS. Why iOS? Until now, iPhones, iPads and Macs were the devices with the least support for web-based virtual reality. Mozilla’s app fixes that, and provides a prototype for upcoming WebXR browser support.
You can experiment with WebXR without this app in your browser, using the recently released WebXR polyfill:
https://github.com/mozilla/webxr-polyfill
Keep up to date on the Twitter feed:
https://twitter.com/hashtag/webxr?lang=en
And Amazon’s new Design platform, Sumerian, will feature WebXR support:
https://aws.amazon.com/sumerian/
Time to get rolling – in short order, browser-based, open-standards, HTML/CSS/JavaScript smartphone VR, AR, and MR will be able to directly challenge “native app” performance, while exceeding in reach and use of the cloud.