Snapchat’s Dress Up feature turns your phone into an AR shopping mall

Image: Snap

It is becoming a fundamental law of the internet that people must also shop. Every social network and messaging app on the planet has spent the last couple of years trying to make it easier to buy things.

The plans on this front are more ambitious than most. You see a shirt you like on a stranger, figure out what it is and where to buy it, try it on, wear it, and return it because everything looks better on Ryan Reynolds. Most of the tech can be used within websites and retailer apps. There is always a buy button.

That's a lot to do, but it's moving quickly. The company announced on Thursday at its annual Creator Summit that it's expanding its augmented reality try-on features that let users use their cameras to virtually try on glasses and clothes, and it's also creating an in-app hub called Dress Up that it hopes could.

Dress Up is not meant to feel like a catalog of stuff to buy. It's not just a product-feed shopping tab, it's also the head of augmented reality strategy and product.

Image: Snapchat

When you open the Dress Up hub and pick an item, you will be able to try it on, but also take a picture of how it looks on you and share it with your friends. Dress Up will have creator content, as well as tips and ideas from brands, all changing based on what you like, how you use the platform, and even where you are located. Everything can be purchased in a tap or two.

How many times do you need to use augmented reality to find a couch in your living room? More than 250 million users have used an augmented reality shopping lens, and the data shows that they convert a higher percentage of potential buyers than a normal ad. She said that the appeal goes back to the idea that shopping is more than just buying something.

The biggest challenge for Snap will be to grow its catalog so that people can buy all the things they want. It has required a lot of specialized work to build three-dimensional digital versions of everything you make. The technology it announced is called snap augmented reality image processing and uses machine learning to take regular product photos and turn them into 3D models. The tech comes from Forma, a virtual-try-on company. The only thing users need to do is take a full-body selfies.

Image: Snap

The company has been working on the technology for about 18 months, and has been testing it with a few brands before rolling it out to more businesses this year.

Every other platform trying to embrace in-app shopping has to be careful not to let the buying experience get in the way of everything else. If you want to shop for your friends and favorite celebrities, you're going to have to hide your photo behind a hundred buttons, but if you want to buy their eye shadow, necklace, and plant behind them, you're going to have to hide your photo behind a hundred buttons The reason for the creation of Dress Up's own tab was due to the fact that it was not necessary to integrate the feature everywhere else.

She is confident that people like to shop. We're meeting people where their mindset isn't just, and I'm coming to this tab to buy a pair of Prada sunglasses.

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