Important Universal AR SDK update (iOS 16.4 regressions)

Hi everyone! :wave:

This update outlines the current situation relating to regressions in iOS 16.4. You may have recently seen a Universal AR SDK product update about this in your notification center - if not, please do sign up for updates about your favourite tools from your Notification Settings!

During our usual testing of pre-release versions of iOS, we became aware of a bug/regression in Safari’s camera device selection in the iOS 16.4 betas. The nature of the bug is this - the ‘default’ rear facing camera that Safari chooses is the ultrawide lens rather than the normal camera, for devices that feature such a camera (e.g. iPhone 11 and later). This means that the camera feed for rear facing experiences (e.g. world tracking or image tracking) looks a bit weird and much more ‘zoomed out’ and the quality of the tracking will be reduced.

We’ve been working with Apple both in the WebKit Bugzilla issue for the bug, and over email, to get it addressed before general release, but Apple have indicated that there’s a good chance that the regression will ship in 16.4.

We’ve prepared an update of our platform, and the suite of Universal AR SDKs, that works around the bug. We recommend you update to the latest version of our SDKs if your web based Universal AR experience uses the rear facing camera.

Of course, our lovely support team are on hand if you have any questions. If you have any concerns, please don’t hesitate to send an email to support@zappar.com and we will be more than happy to help!