Category: Samsung Internet

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New Samsung Gear VR Web Browser Now Available

As part of the continued stream of announcements for the Samsung Gear VR taking place at the Samsung Unpacked event, New York, today, Oculus VR has announced the launch of a brand new web browser for the mobile virtual reality (VR) device. Available now, the Oculus Browser is available for all commercial editions of the Samsung Gear VR.

The Oculus Browser is a fully native app that renders video, images, and text on the Samsung Gear VR, as well as letting you search the web directly from Home. Using the virtual keyboard users can navigate search engines, websites and social media channels just like you would on a desktop. The browser brings 2D and most 360 degree video content right into Oculus Home.

Whether or not the Oculus Browser is the first taste of the ‘Carmel’ browser revealed at Oculus Connect 3 (outside of the developer preview build for Oculus Rift) late last year is not yet known. However, for regular users of the Samsung Gear VR, any improvement over the previous default browser, Samsung Internet, will be welcomed.

There’s plenty more details on Samsung and Oculus VR’s initiatives to come from today’s Samsung Unpacked event, and VRFocus will keep you updated with all the latest details.

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Samsung Internet Update Adds ‘Experimental’ WebVR 1.0 Support

Samsung Internet Update Adds ‘Experimental’ WebVR 1.0 Support

WebVR continues to build in momentum heading into the new year. Samsung recently added new layers to its VR web-browsing app for its Samsung Internet Browser for Gear VR with improved support for the WebVR API.

This update includes  support for the “experimental” JavaScript API, WebVR v1.0. This incrementally builds on the previous WebVR integration, which lets users access 360 videos from platforms like YouTube and other VR web pages from within Gear VR.

The Internet app update also takes users to new 360 worlds while making browsing a lot easier. Its most notable addition is the Change Background feature, implemented with the help of cloud rendering company, OTOY. This allows users to customize their own VR space to browse in, from hazy colorful landscapes to sleek monochrome rooms, giving them freedom to set the scene that best interests them as opposed to generic blank menus.

Interestingly, website makers can also set their own 360 backgrounds for browsing with a new Skybox feature. Imagine heading to UploadVR, say, and finding yourself surrounded by our offices as you scroll through the news.

Another upgraded feature is File Explorer. This essentially allows for a much easier way to go through your images and videos, whether on your phone or USB, with its new on-the-go feature. To help make the platform more accessible, users can utilize voice recognition, an on-screen keyboard with 11 languages, and integration of Bluetooth accessories such as keyboards, mice, and gamepads.

Samsung’s VR browsing app is perhaps one of the more advanced web browsers among VR headsets, but other companies have been catching up in the past month. Oculus recently gave us some insight into what we can expect from Carmel, its own VR web browser that was revealed at Connect 3 in October, with an early release of a developer preview, also on Gear.

Google, meanwhile, is at a very early stage with its experimental WebVR support aimed at developers, and launched the WebVR API on Chrome for Android to test it out. A stable build of the support should be releasing next month for Daydream headsets.

Samsung Internet for Gear VR is free on the Oculus Store. If you have any interest in this early stage of WebVR content, we suggest you check it out.

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