Google dropped Playground, Playmoji AR features on Pixel 4a and future phones

Google dropped support for its augmented reality (AR) ‘Playmoji‘ on the Pixel 4a, and the feature won’t return on future Pixel devices.

The search giant confirmed to 9to5Google that the lack of Playmoji on the 4a was intentional. Further, Google says it will continue to “bring ARCore and its latest features to Pixel 4a and the many other ARCore-enabled devices. Playground will be supported on earlier Pixel devices and we’ll focus our efforts on building great AR experiences that serve a much wider audience.”

Playground was a camera mode accessible in the Google Camera app on Pixels. Users can access Playground from the ‘More’ tab in the Camera app (except on the 4a), which gives access to the Playmoji and other AR objects. Google offered downloaded Playmoji packs with characters from movies, such as The Avengers, 2D stickers and floating signs with custom messages.

Unfortunately, the notable Playmoji from Star Wars, Stranger Things, Detective Pikachu and Childish Gambino are no longer available to download.

While definitely a bummer that Playmoji are going away, I can’t imagine many people used them a lot. Outside of messing around with them for articles I wrote, I never touched the Playmoji. Considering Google says it plans to focus on AR experiences for a wider audience, I expect that means the company will double down on its popular AR Search feature. That works on most iOS and Android devices with support for AR.

Source: 9to5Google