WebXR Hit-test

Category: Device
Type: New or changed feature
Status: Enabled by default (Chrome 81)
Intent stage: Shipped

Summary

The Hit-test API is an extension to the WebXR Device API that provides the capability of raycasting into the real world as understood by the underlying XR system. The goal is to provide a simple API that allows apps to place objects in the real world by casting rays that can be evaluated against the underlying platform's understanding of the real world geometry, regardless of how that is implemented (e.g., hit test against detected planes, point clouds, meshes, etc.).

Standards & signals

Specification: https://immersive-web.github.io/hit-test/
Firefox: Positive — Response from one of main Mozilla contributors, not an official position from the company.
Safari: No signal
Web developers: Positive — Libraries such as Model Viewer (https://modelviewer.dev/examples/augmented-reality.html) and A-Frame (https://aframe.io/blog/webxr-ar-module/) have been implementing AR experiences behind experimental flags as it is a commonly requested feature. These experiences are directly (model-viewer) or indirectly (A-Frame) using Hit Tests.
Tracking bug: https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=833633

Docs: https://github.com/immersive-web/hit-test/blob/master/explainer.md

Samples: https://storage.googleapis.com/chromium-webxr-test/latest.html?target=proposals/phone-ar-hit-test.html

Explainers: https://github.com/immersive-web/hit-test/blob/master/hit-testing-explainer.md

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