Google VR Support For Chrome: Search Giant To Add Support For WebVR Soon? [VIDEO]
Pretty soon, VR aficionados would be able to take virtual reality to new levels, as recent reports suggest that the latest versions of Google Chrome Beta and Chrome Dev for Android would carry VR compatibility. With this development, VR users would be able to extend their virtual reality experience to traditional web browsing.
What is particularly interesting about this development is the fact that all websites on the internet could soon be viewed through the use of VR glasses. Previously, only select websites that are specifically created to cater to the VR experience could be viewed via VR headset.
The VR compatibility for Chrome Beta and Chrome Dev is rooted in Google's WebVR initiative, which is a set of standard capabilities that allow developers to create content for VR-enabled websites. In the latest builds of Chrome Beta, a WebVR setting has already been enabled, allowing VR compatibility with websites built against WebVR Standards.
Chrome Dev for Android, on the other hand, is already equipped with a VR Shell setting, which allows users who are using Google Cardboard or Daydream-ready VR viewers to browse the internet and enter any website, regardless of the way the sites were initially designed.
In a statement to Road to VR, Josh Carpenter, one of the developers working on Google's WebVR initiative, explained how the new Chrome compatibility could be applied to conventional internet use.
"Today I can view a WebVR scene on an iOS [device], even if Mobile Safari doesn't support WebVR API, thanks to a polyfill + device accelerometers. Which is awesome. The web's got reach," he said.
"What the WebVR API gives us on top of that is much richer ecosystem support, things like link traversal between WebVR experiences without dropping out of VR mode, and more."
VR browsing on the web has already been explored by other tech companies. Just last year, Samsung launched a VR web browser that was specifically designed to work with its Gear VR headset. As much as the innovation was well-received, however, its unavailability to devices outside Samsung's premium ecosystem meant that it was only utilized fully by a select few users.
With Google's recent initiative, mainstream VR has just gotten closer than ever.
