What's the difference between VR, AR, and MR?

Eric Hale • February 28, 2020

VR, AR, MR, oh my! What’s the difference?



If you’re confused about the difference between AR, VR, and MR after seeing so many recent articles in this space, join the club. After having several conversations over the last month with folks in which the differences were clarified, I thought it would be helpful to others to share my findings.

Let’s start with Virtual Reality (VR):

This is a 3-D simulation that creates an environment that can be on the scale from cartoonish to relatively realistic. Most environments will let you interact with the experience with the help of body movements and hardware components. Some examples of where you may see Virtual Reality these days are:

  • Immersive video games
  • VR employment recruiting
  • VR marketing for outdoor and home remodeling

Next, Augmented Reality (AR):

Augmented Reality consists of wearing a headset or device and seeing a view of the real world either directly or indirectly through the device. It could also be looking through a device or another physical item that creates an overlay. Additional content or information is dropped into your view like a heads-up display. Remember Google Glass? That was an example of augmented reality.


And then, there's Mixed Reality (MR):

Imagine this as the point where Virtual and Augmented reality meet. In MR, you see synthetic content painted into real-world scenes. The synthetic content isn’t necessarily static, yet it interacts with the real content you’re seeing. Think of the wildly popular “Pokémon Go” game. Not only do you see virtual Pokémon figures, but you also see them anchored appropriately to a table top or park bench.


Exciting Times Ahead

As we move forward in technology, the addition of information and content to virtual or real worlds to make everyday experiences more immersive grows in popularity. Car manufacturers are experimenting with augmented reality to change the way we see driving data, therapists are beginning to use virtual reality to treat PTSD and other conditions, and marketing is driving even more uses of these technologies to sell products. The number of ways to integrate VR, AR, and MR with existing technologies is virtually boundless, and I’m excited to see where we go from here.


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