Watch how a mixed reality app transforms a space into a haunted house

Watch the unveiling of Meta's Quest 3S mixed reality headset

Meta's social apps like Facebook and Instagram are the most high-profile part of its business, but the company has sought building out a hardware line of peripherals like the Quest headset, which combines virtual and augmented reality.

Meta's Quest and other mixed reality devices can make learning new skills easier

PianoVision utilizes the passthrough visibility of a headset to illuminate which keys to play on a real piano or keyboard, providing an immersive, software-based learning alternative to human instruction. Similar apps also offer virtual model replacements for physical devices, such as a virtual piano, to practice with.

What is mixed reality?

Mixed reality is a technology that blends the physical and digital worlds, allowing virtual and real objects to coexist and interact in real-time. It combines elements of both virtual reality and augmented reality, enabling users to perceive and manipulate digital content as if it were part of their physical environment.

A fictional glimpse into the future of AR

Hyper-Reality is a project that presents a provocative and kaleidoscopic new vision of the future, where physical and virtual realities have merged, and the city is saturated in media. Watch this six-minute video to experience the vision.

Watch a first-person demo of Microsoft's HoloLens

The headset enables users to interact with projected objects in augmented reality by combining Windows Mixed Reality with eye- and head-tracking sensors, a hand-operated controller, and a microphone that can pick up voice commands.

Sets incorporating immersive mixed reality have transformed weather reporting

The technology enables presenters to step into virtual environments that incorporate 3D models and real-time data, providing more engaging and interactive forecasting. They have also facilitated the development of educational segments where meteorologists use virtual models to explain complex weather phenomena.

A 1992 failed parachute test provided the hardware for the first mixed reality system

The Virtual Fixtures platform was developed to improve human dexterity by merging physical and virtual objects with haptic feedback from an upper-body exoskeleton. Tight budgeting and significant equipment needs nearly canceled the project, were it not for salvaging and repairing cameras and sensors from a smashed experimental parachute rig.

The perception of haunted places is influenced by psychology, setting and suggestion

Gothic architecture and tragic histories contribute to the perception of hauntings. Infrasound and black mold can cause experiences reminiscent of paranormal phenomena. Although paranormal investigators use technology to seek natural explanations, many paranormal experiences remain non-falsifiable.

Playing around with an AR sandbox

The white sand acts as a projector screen and a topographic map image is projected on the surface. An XBOX Kinect is positioned to read the contours of the sand and draw new topographic lines according to how the sand is moved.

A virtual reality experience of Machu Picchu

If you can’t make it to the Andes, this virtual-reality experience—created using 360-degree cameras, and 3D modeling and sound design—is the next best thing. It lets you explore all the site’s major landmarks, including the Sun Temple and the Temple of the Condor, while listening to the sound of the wind whipping through the ruins, birdsong, and audio commentaries from expert guides.

Horror offers opportunities to safely experiment with fear

Researchers at Denmark’s Aarhus University study people attracted to what they call “recreational fear,” which includes any media (like a horror movie) or experience (like a haunted house) that’s intended to give them a scare. They say these people appreciate playing with fears and anxieties safely.

Pepsi uses augmented reality to prank people at a bus shelter

Commuters at a London bus stop have seen alien invasions, monsters from the sewers grabbing pedestrians and tigers running down the street as part of an elaborate advertising campaign.

How Google's Tilt Brush brings artists' creations to life

Google has been working closely with more than 60 artists to help them explore their style in virtual reality as part of the Tilt Brush Artist in Residence program.

Could this pseudo-psychedelic VR experience decrease symptoms of depression?

Researchers report that virtual reality and psychedelics may be leave users with similar insights and therapeutic benefits. Try out this free psychedelic virtual reality experience to see if this holds true for you. According to the program’s creators, a study into the efficacy of this 45-minute experience indicates it may help alleviate symptoms of mild to moderate depression.

A virtual art gallery in the mode of 'Doom'

One of the earliest video games to use 3D interfaces, 1993's "Doom" was a first-person shooter set on the moons of Mars which ended in hell. It became one of the most critically and commercially successful games of all time. Now, you can wander virtually in an art gallery in the mode of the game, sipping wine and perusing pixelated versions of classic works of art.

See this first-person virtual reality view of vertigo

This video shows a virtual reality environment view of what benign paroxysmal positional vertigo will look like, from a first-person view. It includes a virtual rendering of eye spinning associated with the condition. (Warning: Watching this may make some users feel a bit nauseous.)

Take a 360-degree look inside Hong Kong's coffin homes

Hong Kong's lack of affordable housing is forcing hundreds of thousands of residents to live in "coffin homes" — a tiny partitioned apartment that is about the size of a coffin. Experience life inside a coffin home through this 360 VR video.

Abandoned malls prompt 'liminal' vibes of being stuck in time

A Toronto-area tour of empty malls brings participants face-to-face with the past. Part nostalgia, part archaeology, this meditation on the "liminal" spaces of a bygone era provokes eerie reflections on our relationship to time and place.

Explore the Earth at night from space

See the planet in all its luminosity with this NightEarth app, an interactive spherical globe showing real satellite imagery of Earth. Toggle between views of real-time clouds, aurora borealis activity, and more.

After 25 people used virtual reality headsets to practice flying with virtual wings—flapping their arms—their visual cortex responded to the wings almost as if they were real arms, treating them as body parts.

The first horror movie is believed to be George Méliès' 1986 short 'The Haunted Castle,' which pioneered the use of special effects

Explore Pompeii with an interactive map packed with 60+ key sites

This tool provides detailed information on major landmarks—from the Villa of Mysteries to the House of the Tragic Poet—and suggests themed walking routes based on visit length. A companion app adds virtual reconstructions and a full audioguide.

Decentraland is a virtual world that runs on Ethereum

Users can buy plots of land in the virtual Decentraland universe to collect, trade, and battle Pokemon-like monsters in the video game “Axie Infinity.”

A Hitchcock film has been adapted for a new demographic: smartphone users

Hitchcock's "The Lodger," a silent film from 1927, has been adapted for Tattle TV, a video app featuring "vertical microdramas" aimed at smartphone users looking for bite-sized stories.

Go inside a real beehive with this interactive

Beehives are where the magic honey-making happens, where thousands of honeybees beat their wings, throw up partially-digested nectar to further purify it into sugars, and make wax. The goings-on of a beehive—the name for a man-made habitat for...

This site reaches millions of visitors who are tired of AI chatbots and seeking human connection. Pretend to be an AI chatbot and ask questions, provide answers, and draw for people in real time.

Reexamine the Thanksgiving story through this interactive game

This interactive experience casts you as a high school journalist uncovering how the Thanksgiving narrative has become simplified. Through animations, maps, primary sources, expert interviews, and text-message riddles, the game turns historical investigation into an engaging, hands-on mystery.

Temu uses gamification techniques to encourage customers to shop on its app

Games include a spinning roulette wheel that offers coupon rewards, promises free delivery, and more. Some have said it’s tough to pull themselves out of the Temu ecosystem once they’re in it.

According to the physics of black holes, our 4D reality may be a hologram—a projection of information coded on a 2D surface on the edge of the universe.

Take a 3D tour of the Hajj, Islam's annual pilgrimage to Mecca, undertaken by more than 1.5 million Muslims each year.

Explore an interactive map built from more than 100,000 survey responses on where people find joy in their lives

See these 16 pieces of art evoking phobias of snakes, flying, spiders, and more. 

Play the role of a student in a game where you try to navigate college and remain debt-free, selecting different income levels, high school experience, race, ethnicity, and more.

This real-time tracking of the hantavirus cruise ship outbreak in May 2026 offers a unique glimpse into the global reach of the outbreak and whether the virus sickened passengers and their communities around the world.

Visualize how CRISPR-Cas9—a type of immune system used by single-celled organisms to attack invasive viruses—targets and makes precise changes to a gene's DNA.

Explore the known asteroids, comets, and spacecraft involved in asteroid studies within our solar system with 'Eyes on Asteroids,' a 3D visualization from NASA.

Massive 3D printers have been used to build homes by stacking layers of 'concrete toothpaste,' a fire-resistant material that effectively insulates against outside noise.

A 2019 Facebook event called on attendees to "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," resulting in countless memes, the creation of a music festival, and eventually the arrests of those who did try to approach the area.

Children are now three times more likely to say they want to be a YouTuber when they grow up than an astronaut, with some even attending 'YouTube camps' that teach kids how to create content for the platform.

Planeterrellas create artificial auroras that mimic the atmospheric displays of light by setting up an electric field between two metal balls in a jar filled with a small amount of air.

Fish populations in the Great Barrier Reef have increased after installing waterproof speakers on the ocean floor that played recordings of sounds from healthy coral reefs.

The 1987 Nintendo video game 'Stadium Events' isn't known for being particularly fun, but its scarcity has made it a highly sought-after item that has sold for up to $35K at auction.

See a 3D reconstruction of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital that was home to an estimated population of 200,000 to 400,000.

Explore chaos in this simulation of two double pendulums, where small differences in the release angles produce wildly different outcomes.

Long before Major League Baseball began allowing instant replay for balls and strikes, an umpire reluctantly used the technology to determine whether a hit was a home run, a move that inadvertently ushered in a new era for the sport.

In 2025, four executives from large tech companies were given positions in the US Army Reserves—including Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar, which reinforced Palantir's ties with the US military and its role as a leading defense partner.

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

Netflix profits when you're not watching, and its movies are designed that way—read a detail-rich critical essay exposing lesser-known Netflix takes

Explore what it's like inside a patient isolation unit, used in situations such as treating a patient or suspected patient with Ebola.

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.