Extended reality

Extended reality (XR) is an umbrella term for various immersive technologies, including augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) as well as a means to interpolate between them and extend beyond them.Wearable Artificial Intelligence and Spatial Extended Reality for Humanity and Earth, IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine, Pages 4-8, 2162-2248 © 2025 IEEE. IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine, Published by the IEEE Consumer Technology Society, Free open-access link: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=11274497Uğurluer, Simge, and Mert Seven. "A bibliometric analysis of extended reality research trends in communication studies written in English: Mapping the increasing adoption of extended reality technologies." Connectist: Istanbul University Journal of Communication Sciences 66 (2024): 147-181.Hoffmann, Peter. "The Merging of Worlds and… of Immersion." Next Generation Internet: The Merging of Reality and Virtuality in the Metaverse. Wiesbaden: Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden, 2025. 25-77. It is intended to combine or mirror the physical world, using a "digital twin" able to interact with it, and give users an immersive experience by being in a virtual, augmented, intelligent or digital environment.

The first usage of the term "extended reality" was in reference to the use of technology to extrapolate (extend) beyond typical human perception, e.g. allowing us to see sound waves, radio waves, and otherwise invisible phenomena.Mann, Steve, and Charles Wyckoff. "Extended reality." Cambridge, Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1991): 4-405.

XR is rapidly growing beyond research and is now being applied in medicine,Andrews, Christopher, Michael K. Southworth, Jennifer NA Silva, and Jonathan R. Silva. "Extended reality in medical practice." Current treatment options in cardiovascular medicine 21 (2019): 1-12.Morimoto, Tadatsugu, Takaomi Kobayashi, Hirohito Hirata, Koji Otani, Maki Sugimoto, Masatsugu Tsukamoto, Tomohito Yoshihara, Masaya Ueno, and Masaaki Mawatari. "XR (extended reality: virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality) technology in spine medicine: status quo and quo vadis." Journal of Clinical Medicine 11, no. 2 (2022): 470. architecture,Trindade, Nuno Verdelho, Alfredo Ferreira, João Madeiras Pereira, and Sérgio Oliveira. "Extended reality in AEC." Automation in Construction 154 (2023): 105018. education,Alnagrat, Ahmed, Rizalafande Che Ismail, Syed Zulkarnain Syed Idrus, and Rawad Mansour Abdulhafith Alfaqi. "A review of extended reality (XR) technologies in the future of human education: Current trend and future opportunity." Journal of Human Centered Technology 1, no. 2 (2022): 81-96. industry,Vasarainen, Minna, Sami Paavola, and Liubov Vetoshkina. "A systematic literature review on extended reality..." Internationa Journal of Virtual Reality 21, no. 2 (2021): 1-28. entertainment, cinema, marketing, real estate, manufacturing,Doolani, Sanika, Callen Wessels, Varun Kanal, Christos Sevastopoulos, Ashish Jaiswal, Harish Nambiappan, and Fillia Makedon. "A review of extended reality (xr) technologies for manufacturing training." Technologies 8, no. 4 (2020): 77. education, maintenance, and remote work. Extended reality can be used for joint effort in the workplace, training, educational purposes, therapeutic treatments, and data exploration and analysis.

Extended reality works by using visual data acquisition that is either accessed locally or shared and transferred over a network and to the human senses. By enabling real-time responses in a virtual stimulus, XR devices are able to create customized experiences.

XR can be applied not only to humans as a subject, but also to technology as a subject, where the user or the technology can have its sensory capacity extended by placing it in a closed feedback loop. The term "veillametrics" refers to the measurement of a subject's ability to sense, for example, its ability to observe.Janzen, R. et al. (2018, August). “Painting with the eyes”: Sensory perception flux time-integrated on the physical world. In 2018 IEEE Games, Entertainment, Media Conference (GEM) (pp. 239-245). IEEE.Janzen, Ryan Edward. Extended intelligence and mediated reality veillametrics in the space, time, frequency, and amplitude domains. University of Toronto (Canada), 2019.

In 2018 the BBC launched a research project to capture and document the barriers present in extended reality environments.

The International Institute of MetaNumismatics (INIMEN) studies the applications of extended reality technologies in numismatic research, with a dedicated department.International Institute of MetaNumismatics, INIMEN Report 1 (2019-2024)

Extended reality

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