In this article, we would be discussing some of the top Augmented Reality development kits. But before that, we would like to brief you about the jargons – “Augmented Reality “and “Software development Kit”.

 

Augmented Reality:

 

Augmented Reality as the name says something augmented on top of a real-time environment. It is a digital technology in which computer-generated object interacts with a real-time environment.

 

Software Development Kit:

 

A Software development kit is a collection of software tools that assist developers to write software programs.

A software development kit comprises of multiple application development components such as an editor, a compiler, a linker, a visual screen builder and many more.

 

 

Let’s now start our discussion about some of the top AR SDKs:

 

1.    Apple ARKit

Apple introduced to the world an amazing Augmented Reality development kit with the release of iOS 11. With this SDK, AR mobile app developer can create unmatched Augmented Reality solutions for iOS devices. Later on, ARKit 2 was released which was Apple’s third major release for its AR platform to provide enhanced AR features.

 

Key Features of Apple ARKit

 

This Apple AR SDK platform supports iOS and Mac OS.

 

With shared Augmented Reality feature, now multiple users can use the iOS device and experience the AR simultaneously.

 

With the persistent AR feature, Now your AR app would provide you AR experiences that persist between sessions and can be resumed back at a later time.

 

ARKit 2 offers a full 2D image tracking feature. This helps users to incorporate movable objects like product boxes or magazines into your AR experiences. With the help of this AR SDK, users can detect known 3D objects such as toys, furniture and so on.

 

Apple ARKit provides an incredible feature called Quick Look objects which helps users to view 3D objects in the real world.

 

 

2.    Google’s ARCore

Just like Apple’s ARKit, Google too created an AR SDK which is named as ARCore which helps AR app developers to develop augmented reality apps.

 

Key Features of Google ARCore

 

Apart from Android, ARCore supports other major platforms including Windows and iOS as well.

 

The Light Estimation feature of ARCore assists users to estimate the lighting conditions in real-time.

 

With the feature of Motion Tracking, the app users can now monitor their phone’s position with respect to their surroundings.

 

It has an Environmental Understanding feature that helps your phone to identify the size and location of all type of surfaces such as horizontal.

 

With the recent updates, Google added UI components-Plane Finding and Object Manipulation to ARCore kit for better AR experiences to end users.

 

 

3. Wikitude AR SDK

 

Wikitude SDK is an Augmented Reality development kit that supports multiple devices such as smartphones, tablets and smart glasses. And it is also compatible with multiple platforms and frameworks such as Android, iOS, Windows, React native, Iconic, Titanium and many more.

 

Key features of Wikitude AR SDK

 

The location-based feature in Wikitude AR SDK assists developers to create multiple location-based markers and this helps app users to interact with the augmentations overlaying them.

 

The image recognition feature helps in recognizing up to 1000 images without any network connection but for a larger project where there are thousands of such images, Wikitude SDK comes with cloud-based recognition feature. This makes a high recognition rate.

 

Object Recognition feature in Wikitude AR SDK provides app users a holistic real-time AR experience around real-time objects pre-defined by users. And with Scene Recognition feature, developers can even identify, track and augment bigger objects, rooms, and scenes.

 

Wikitude AR SDK also supports SLAM (Simultaneous Localization and Mapping) technology which maps and understands the 3D objects and scenes through feature points.

 

 

4.    Vuforia AR SDK

This is another great AR SDK developed by Vuforia for building AR application solutions. With Vuforia’s Augmented Reality solutions, leading industry players are digitally transforming their products and services.

 

Key Features of Vuforia AR SDK

 

Vuforia AR SDK identifies and tracks planar images and 3D objects in real time by the use of computer vision technology.

 

It offers APIs in multiple programming languages such as C++, Java, Objective C++ and .Net languages.

 

This AR SDK has an additional feature named Occlusion which identifies and tracks targets even if the target is partially hidden behind some kind of barrier.

 

 

Closing Words

Hope, the above discussion related to Augmented Reality technology would help AR application developers in developing incredible AR apps and mark their presence in the era of Augmented Reality.