Google shuts down Project Tango and focuses its energies on the more more scaleable ARCore platform

Google is shutting the doors on Project Tango, it’s four-year old AR (Augmented Reality) platform, as it focuses its energies on the faster, more scalable ARCore platform. Google pronounced Project Tango’s death sentence via a tweet, where they stated that they would drop support for the program on 1 March, 2018. [caption id=“attachment_4261361” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] ARCore allows for some spectacular experiences[/caption] Project Tango was an attempt at bringing the benefits of AR to mobile devices, but it did so with a hardware toll. Good AR requires a device to have a more enhanced awareness of its surroundings. Tango did this by introducing additional cameras and hardware for improved positional tracking at scale. Among the first Tango devices were the Lenovo Phab 2 Pro and the ASUS ZenFone AR. Both platforms were interesting, but expensive and not viable. As ArsTechnica notes, the extra hardware didn’t make Tango-devices that much more useful or compelling than a regular device. Apple took another track where it implemented AR via machine learning and the onboard cameras on its iPhones. Google’s ARCore took a similar approach. Tango was a good first attempt, but advancements in machine learning techniques and a more mature ARCore platform has since rendered Tango redundant.\

If the recently released AR Stickers app is anything to go by, ARCore is already leagues ahead of Tango, and more useful.