Augmented Reality (AR) is a growing version of the real world that is accomplished through the use of digital visuals of sound, elements, or other sensory devices and delivered via technology. It is an advanced trend among companies.
At a professional and personal level, Augmented Reality(AR) has come across in many of our everyday uses. AR is a phenomenon, especially in business. AR can already solve some of the most significant issues and pain points. AR will make a significant impact on companies all over the world. And for that we don’t have to wait anymore. From education to field work, I categorize some of the best-Augmented Reality use cases that will appear in the near future.
Augmented Reality use Cases
Education
- Classroom Education
As technology like tablets and laptops have become widespread in many educational institutions and classrooms, teachers and educators are now functioning students’ learning experience with AR. Google Classroom, for example, is already being used. So that students can attend their classes through a smartphone, laptop, or tablet for a greater learning experience. Students who are learning music might be able to view musical notes in real time as they also know how to play an instrument. And those who are learning astronomy could see an entire map of the solar system.
- Excellent learning experiences
Students can utilize AR to research and analyze their subject matter in a great 3D environment. AR eases the understanding of critical concepts and gamifies the student experience with full control and safety. The research concludes that applying AR in education has more sense, leading to students’ involvement and knowledge retention.
Healthcare
- Patient’s Self-care
AR tech has the potential to enrich the depth and efficiency of medical training in various areas. AR holds the potential to ease complicated medical procedures and treatment possibilities by providing information in easy-to-digest environments. Patients can use AR to
- Keep track of and improve their treatment outcomes
- Get help from the nearest medical
- See their medical data
- Explain their symptoms to the doctors with the help of visualization tools
- Get notified about the healthy lifestyle options
- Augmented Surgeries
AR can help surgeons as a helping tool in surgeries. AR glasses or head-mounted devices allow surgeons to
- Monitor patient status in real-time
- View visual scans (MRI, CT, etc.)
- Notice abnormal surgical encounters
- Get remote assistance from professionals
Business-specific Applications
- Remote Work
According to some research, Remote workers’ one of the biggest struggles is loneliness, and 20% of remote workers realize that communication and collaboration are their most extensive effort. While traditional 2D communication systems, such as video calls on various platforms, are effective and important in communication. Research indicates that 56% of people who did remote work following the pandemic are not as productive in group tasks.
For industries that have collaborative design, product development, and simulations in their business operations, AR in remote work is mainly a blessing for them. While reducing associated costs, the visualization boosts remote collaboration and speeds up development processes.
- Recruitment of Employees
At present, many companies take the initiative to apply a hybrid/remote work model, which enhances the need for digital recruiting procedures. AR can be implemented to evaluate candidate performance in the selection process through simulations that perfectly reflect on-the-job situations. Companies can assess the candidate’s skills while tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) like-
- Movement of eyes
- Dwell and completion time etc.
AR is also beneficial for representing the business’ values, workplace, and business culture by activating candidates to experience them without ever visiting the office physically. This makes flexibility, especially for companies with remote working settings, and permits for an accessible recruitment process.
- Training
Employee training should be mandatory for the betterment of a company. AR training has proven itself in employee skill training in healthcare, construction, and many other industries. In addition to fasten training speed, engagement, and knowledge gathering, AR training also consists of the following:
- Less training costs at scale
- Unlimited repetition as needed
- A safe and secure environment for trainers and trainees
- Additional analytical and tracking tools.
Sales & Marketing
- Attractive Ads
In terms of memory encryption, getting attention, audience engagement and emotional intensity, AR experiences are so effective. Using AR in digital marketing can help to catch experience-centric consumers and achieve more growth in brand awareness, conversion rates, and also in sales. Here is some example of potential advertisement mediums to apply AR:
- Billboards
- Filters
- Product packages
- Magazines, flyers, etc.
- Increase Brand/Product Recall
Gamification and visual representation offered by AR lead to great customer experiences. AR-assisted brand/product experiences significantly grow:
- customer engagement
- brand recognition
- product recall
- Delivering Product Insights
AR can serve as an excellent visual storytelling tool to bring product information. AR helps businesses in delivering their value propositions to customers by visualizing:
- special selling points
- unseen interior attributes
- complicated features.
- Business Logistics
To enhance efficiency and reduce costs across many areas of business logistics AR represents various opportunities. This consists of transportation, warehousing, and route optimization. Some shipping companies have already applied smart AR glasses in some of their warehouses, and this helps them to show workers the shortest route within a warehouse to track down and pick specific items that need to be shipped. At present in the business industry, giving workers more productive and simple ways to fulfill their responsibility is one of the best use cases.
Real Estate
- Virtual Tours
For realtors and potential buyers, property tours are time-consuming and sometimes costly. AR, with the combination of VR solutions, helps buyers virtually visit the property from the comfort of their space, which saves time for both parties. Virtual tours allow realtors to operate with unlimited universal reach.
- Digital Staging
AR solutions help property managers to design unoccupied or incomplete properties according to client requirements. Virtual staging shows buyers what the house will be like after finishing. Customizing the interior design grows client interest and the likelihood of a sale.
Hospitality
In recent years, technology has gone a mile away toward advancing the tourism industry. But AR shows a considerable profit for travel agents. Before traveling, tourists will have a fantastic experience. Imagine before booking a ticket to your dream destination, you can have a virtual tour by the help of AR glasses. AR will make selling trips, travel, and vacations a lot easier in the near future. Augmented Reality can be a strong marketing tool for businesses to ensure modernity and digitalization.
User Experience
- AR manuals
Instead of paper manuals, AR manuals enhance user experience with great visual experiences via electronic devices. AR manuals give value to the lifecycle of the product by assisting
- introduction
- installation
- troubleshooting.
- AR-assisted customer service
At present, many customers prefer digital channels as they are easily accessible and convenient. However, research shows that almost 80% of customers call customer service departments when they face any difficulties or challenges.
Manufacturing
- Product Design & Development
AR boosts development and design processes by erasing the requirement for physical prototypes and expanding collaboration which speeds up methods while decreasing costs.
- Equipment Maintenance
AR eases equipment maintenance by ensuring quality remote assistance, which brings reduced downtimes and increases work efficiency.
The combination of AR and VR allow on-site workers to get visual assistance in detail from remote experts while they are ready to work. AR also makes the usage of digital twins easy, and AR manuals to understand potential defects, machinery, and solutions.
- Training & Guidance
Workers have to employ critical machinery and participate in operations like assembly with so many methods. AR solutions make the tasks easy for workers by giving more beneficial training and real-time instructions to make them understand the task easily and complete it quickly. For documents and processes, AR glasses provide smooth data access while employees are ready to work.
Repair & Maintenance
Repair and maintenance of complicated equipment is considered one of the most important industrial use cases of AR. Whether it’s a motor or an MRI machine, repair and maintenance staff are starting to utilize AR headsets and glasses while they do their jobs to give them helpful information on the spot, suggest some fixes, and identify potential trouble areas. This use case will only deliver powerful machine-to-machine IoT technology that can provide information to AR headsets directly.
Fashion & Trend
- Fashion
To experiment with product placement, various types of AR dressing rooms are created for consumers. It has the function of digitally trying on clothes, changing the color of the product, sampling different shoes, many accessories, makeup products, and many more.
- Design and Modeling
Design prototypes are costly. So as an alternative to this, designers are using AR to create 3D models. This can be viewed in the real world for better understanding, modification, development, and presenting their projects.
- Shopping
By using AR technology, buyers can experience how the product will look in their environment. And if they don’t like it, they are able to change color and style before purchasing. Buyers can also better understand how a product works and functions through AR animations.
Mobile Commerce
The present generation goes far away from the E-commerce era. They are dwelling in the world of mobile commerce, and here users can purchase products through their hand-held devices. With the help of AR Brands are trying to improve the user experience. Also they can generate more sales.
Design & Modeling
AR is helping experts to visualize their projects during the full creative process from architecture design and construction. The use of headsets activates architects, engineers, and design professionals to go directly into their buildings and spaces to know how their designs might look and even create virtual on-the-spot changes. Urban planners can even design how complete city layouts might look utilizing AR headset visualization. Any design or modeling tasks involved in dimensional relationships are an appropriate use case for AR tech.
Art Industries
At present, artists are creating digital art pieces in public places. And they can show through AR. People can give notes and doodles in public places also. These notes and doodles are also revealed through AR. Museums have been enriched with AR-guided tours that give extra content about exposed items.
Navigation
Traditional GPS directions are not only being stacked in the user’s line of sight to avoid accidents, and this is caused by distractions. GPS directions are used to show real-time traffic, find locations and even in-building navigation.
Journalism and Mass Communication
By the help of Ar many renowned newspapers around the world enrich their reporting and storytelling. By implementing AR, printed issues are being enhanced with exclusive content, and AR experiences are giving more sensory detail to readers. Perhaps the AR series from The Washington Post is considered the most popular example of how AR is helping to change the trend of storytelling.
Military
AR technology is being utilized to substitute the components like single-use targets, bombs, ammunition, aircraft, and others during military training instead of using expensive equipment. By using AR technology pilots and soldiers can identify their targets easily, avoid risk, gather more information, trace enemy’s location and so on.
Entertainment Properties
Entertainment industry is all about establishing a great relationship with the characters and the audience. Properties like Harry Potter are extremely successful. Because watchers of the movies and readers of the books feel like they can connect with the characters and want additional content. The entertainment industry is now considering AR as a wonderful marketing privilege to build strong bonds between their feelings and their audience. Many media reports showed that the AR sensation Pokemon Go makers are planning to release an AR game soon that fans can interact with and it will have a Harry Potter theme
Gaming
The most popular AR game to date is Pokemon GO. When the game launched and people came to know about it, they went to capture Pokemons digitally and were excited to see it in the real world on the streets. Now in gaming, the possibilities are many and growing constantly.
Field Service
Field service technicians are sent to install, repair or replace a piece of mission-critical equipment every day whether it’s something small or big. That needs to be installed, repaired or replaced and work as soon as possible. Nowadays, these technicians go to the site with AR glasses or headsets which make their work easy. These AR glasses help them to quickly identify whatever they need to repair.
Conclusion
We presented some use cases. But there are many other sectors that can also benefit from Augmented Reality. These AR technologies will continue to grow productivity, reduce travel time, accelerate training and provide all the other benefits we need. AR is here to stay.