There are dozens of existing standards which could, potentially, be useful in Augmented Reality. Some could be used "as is" while others would be more useful to the AR developer community, if they were slightly modified or extended to cover AR use cases. This is always a work in progress, contributions are welcome.
You may also wish to consult the table on our page of standards activities underway.
Content Formats
| Name |
Governing |
More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| MPEG-4 Part 11 (BIFS) | MPEG | More information | Binary format for scenes |
| H.264/AVC | MPEG | More information | video |
| X3D | ISO | More information | Extensible 3D modeling and scene composition |
| COLLADA | Khronos group | More information | 3D interchange format |
| MP3 | MPEG | More information | audio |
| IEEE 1857-2013 | IEEE-SA | More information | Advanced Audio and Video Coding |
Media and Audio APIs
| Name |
Governing |
More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| OpenSL ES | Khronos Group | More information | acceleration for stereo and 3D audio in any embedded platform |
| OpenMAX | Khronos Group | More information | Media acceleration |
| WebRTC | W3C | More information | |
| Video Element | W3C | More information | video in Web browsers |
| Audio Element | W3C | More information | audio in HTML 5 browsers |
| Web Audio | W3C | More information | audio in Web |
| MediaStream | W3C | More information | Continuous real time media in Web |
Graphics APIs
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| OpenGL ES | Khronos Group | More information | Native 3D graphics |
| SVG | W3C | More information | vector graphics |
| WebGL | Khronos Group | More information | JavaScript binding to OpenGL ES for 3D rendering into Canvas |
| Canvas | W3C | More information | |
| X3D | ISO | More information | Extensible 3D modeling and scene composition |
Image Standards
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| PNG | W3C | More information | |
| JPEG | ISO | More information | Photographic bitmap |
Video-Related Standards
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| H.264 AVC | MPEG | More information | |
| Video Element | W3C | More information | for Web browsers |
| IEEE 1857-2013 | IEEE-SA | More information | Advanced Audio and Video Coding |
Location Standards
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| KML | OGC | More information | |
| Web Map Service | OGC | More information | |
| GML | OGC | More information | |
| GeoLocation API | W3C | More information | supported |
| GeoRSS | GeoRSS | More information | |
| GeoJSON | More information | ||
| rfc5870 | IETF | More information |
Hardware control/interfaces
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| Device API | W3C | More information | Device APIs |
Formatting
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| HTML | W3C | More information | |
| CSS | W3C | More information | |
| Web Services Standard | W3C | More information | |
| ARML 2.0 | Open Geospatial Consortium | More information | |
| Darwin Information Typing Architecture | OASIS | More information |
Sensor Standards
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| SensorML | OGC | More information | |
| Sensor Observation Service | OGC | More information | |
| IEEE 21451-7-2011 | IEEE | More information | Smart transducer interface for sensors and actuators |
| Device Motion Event Specification | W3C | More information | supported |
| Device Orientation Event Specification | W3C | More information | supported |
Natural Interaction Standards
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| Touch-based Interactions (Touch Events Specification) | W3C | More information | |
| MPEG-U | ISO | More information |
Programming
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| JavaScript/ECMAScript | ECMA | More information |
Asset Management
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| GeoPackage | Open Geospatial Consortium | More information | storage and transfer of geographic vector features and image tiles |
| IEEE 1484.11.3-2005 | IEEE-SA | More information | Data model for content object communications |
| ISO 15926 | ISO | More information | Industrial automation systems and integration—Integration of life-cycle data for process plants including oil and gas production facilities |
Communications Interfaces and Services
| Name | Governing body | More information | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| IEEE 802 | IEEE-SA | More information | Local Area, Personal Area and Body Area Neworking |
| IEEE 1722 | IEEE-SA | More information | Time-Sensitive Applications on a Bridge Local Network |
| IEEE 1905.1 | IEEE-SA | More information | Convergent Digital Home Network for Heterogeneous Technologies |
Other IEEE-SA standards relevant to Augmented Reality are found on this page.
Other activities in W3C on User Interaction are found in this table. In addition, the W3C has many working groups that develop specifications for graphics. W3C activities in the area of media delivery and presentation are summarized in this table.
Updated March 8, 2015