virtual-reality

Discord Update: August 11, 2026 Changelog (opens in new tab)

Discord’s August 11, 2026 update focuses on profile customization, safer content discovery, and improved social features. It also expands Discord to Meta Quest, adds desktop game embeds, and continues a broader settings redesign. Behind the visible features, Discord upgraded its desktop client to Electron 42, bringing modest CPU improvements. ### Profile and Social Features - Desktop users can format their bios with a WYSIWYG editor instead of memorizing Markdown. - Profiles can now be set to private and shown to everyone, only members of smaller servers, or only friends. - Friend requests can include a note explaining why the request was sent. - New profile Frames are available in the Discord Shop for additional customization. ### Spoiler Channels - Servers can create spoiler text channels that require members to confirm they want to view the content. - This provides an alternative to marking an entire channel as Age Restricted. ### Game Sharing and Meta Quest - Desktop users can mention games with commands such as `@game Palworld`. - Discord embeds the selected game in the message when it has a Discord profile. - Mobile support for game mentions is planned. - Discord is now available on Meta Quest, allowing users to keep the app visible while using other VR experiences. ### Settings and Desktop Improvements - The settings redesign renames **Activity** to **Games & Apps**. - **Content & Social** is now called **Messaging Permissions**. - Related settings, including authorized apps, connections, operating-system-specific pages, and keybindings, have been consolidated. - Several settings pages received updated language and styling, including Data & Privacy and Activity Privacy. - The desktop app now runs on Electron 42, improving maintenance and providing incremental CPU-usage reductions. Discord’s update combines convenience features with ongoing usability and infrastructure work. Users interested in smaller fixes can consult Discord’s patch-note archive or the community bug megathread on r/DiscordApp.

Discord is Now on Meta Quest: Reach Out to Your Servers While in VR (opens in new tab)

Discord is now available directly through Meta’s Horizon App Store, eliminating the need for sideloading, browser workarounds, or a second device. The Meta Quest app provides the full Discord experience in VR, including servers, direct messages, group messages, voice calls, video chats, and gameplay streaming. Eligible users who try the app may also receive a free month of Nitro. ## Full Discord Access in VR - Users can download Discord directly from the Meta Horizon App Store. - The app includes: - All Discord servers - Direct messages and group DMs - Voice calls using the Quest’s built-in microphone - Discord can remain pinned in the VR playspace while users play games such as *Beat Saber* or spend time in VRChat. - Conversations can appear as a floating virtual window alongside other VR activities. ## Meta Avatar Video Chats and Gameplay Streaming - Users can join Discord video calls as their Meta Avatar. - Quest gameplay can be streamed directly to Discord. - This removes previous workarounds involving browser-based streaming and sharing browser tabs. - The feature supports social interaction between users in VR and friends on PCs, phones, or consoles. ## Free Nitro Promotion - New or returning Nitro users may qualify for one free month. - Eligibility is offered after logging into Discord through a Meta Quest headset. - Nitro benefits include: - Higher-quality Go Live streaming - Additional profile customization options - Access to more than 50 games through Xbox Game Pass - Users can check eligibility through Discord’s support documentation. The article recommends downloading Discord from the Quest app store to keep servers, calls, and gaming conversations accessible while in VR. Qualifying users should also claim the promotional Nitro month.

Press Start: How Controllers Shaped Video Game Design—and Where Interfaces May Go Next | Figma Blog (opens in new tab)

Video game interfaces evolved from simple start screens into complex systems of menus, maps, inventories, and customization. Yet the controller’s directional inputs and buttons have remained a consistent foundation, shaping navigation patterns and preserving players’ muscle memory. The article argues that understanding how input devices define interfaces will be essential as AR, VR, and other technologies introduce new ways to interact with digital worlds. ## From Simple Screens to Complex Game Hubs - Early games such as *Tennis for Two*, *Pong*, *PAC-MAN*, and *Super Mario Bros.* offered minimal interfaces, often requiring only a coin insertion or a start button. - Modern AAA games support many features, including: - Multiple game modes - Character customization - Cosmetics stores - Maps and inventories - Quests and settings - These features have transformed games into interconnected hubs of screens, menus, and tabs. - The growth of gaming has helped make it a major cultural and economic industry, supported by livestreaming, esports, and Olympic recognition. ## Controllers as a Design Foundation - From the Atari 2600 to the PlayStation 5, controllers have consistently combined directional controls with buttons. - This consistency allows players to transfer familiar muscle memory between generations of games. - Established controller conventions create predictable navigation patterns for players. - Designers and developers benefit from these conventions because they reduce the need to create entirely new interaction models for every game. ## The Input Defines the Interface - Every platform has a dominant input method that shapes its interface: - Desktop: mouse - Mobile: fingers and touch gestures - Television: remote controls - Mouse interfaces can use small, dense controls because the pointer is fast and precise. - Touch interfaces require larger, more widely spaced controls because fingers are less precise than cursors. - Mobile design also takes advantage of gestures such as tapping, swiping, and pinching. - The article’s broader point is that interface design must reflect the physical capabilities and limitations of the device used to navigate it. ## Preparing for New Forms of Interaction - Game interfaces increasingly connect 2D navigation systems with 3D worlds. - AR and VR controllers may allow players to engage with their physical surroundings as well as digital environments. - As input methods evolve, designers will need to rethink how people move through interfaces, rather than simply adapting existing controller-based patterns. The practical recommendation is to treat input as a core design constraint. By studying how controllers shaped game navigation—and how emerging technologies change physical interaction—designers can build interfaces that feel intuitive across future platforms.

Andrew “Boz” Bosworth's 10 Rules for Navigating the Next Design Paradigm | Figma Blog (opens in new tab)

Andrew “Boz” Bosworth argues that designers entering the next era of AI and spatial computing must challenge inherited assumptions rather than merely improve existing interfaces. His approach begins with real human problems, favors experimentation and intuition, and treats interactions as complete systems. The goal is to create technology that understands users and ultimately becomes nearly invisible. ## Start with real human problems - Identify a specific person with a genuine problem. - Let users determine whether a product is useful through their behavior. - Avoid prioritizing abstract ideas over practical human needs. ## Question inherited design assumptions - Recognize that familiar constraints and interaction patterns are man-made paradigms. - Ask whether the current approach is actually appropriate. - Treat seemingly fixed limitations as potentially changeable. ## Reimagine the interaction paradigm - Current computing often forces users to translate simple intentions into complicated sequences of apps and services. - After decades of desktop and mobile conventions, designers should reconsider the entire model of interaction. - New technology should simplify intentions rather than expose underlying complexity. ## Distinguish invention from optimization - “Zero-to-one” invention happens without established customers or constraints. - Optimization improves and refines an existing product with audience feedback. - AI and spatial interfaces provide greenfield opportunities where old assumptions may not apply. ## Use taste and intuition to choose the right direction - Product development resembles climbing through a difficult problem space. - Intuition helps teams choose promising “terrain” before investing in execution. - Good judgment does not remove the hard work, but it improves the odds of pursuing the right problem. ## Prototype aggressively - Build rough, unconventional prototypes to test whether an idea is worth pursuing. - Meta has used crude physical setups, including tracked hats and mesh-walled rooms, to explore spatial computing. - Direct experimentation reveals possibilities that discussion alone cannot. ## Design the complete system - Spatial products cannot be designed by changing one isolated component. - Gestures, visual/audio/haptic feedback, and resulting functionality must evolve together. - Iteration should happen across the whole interaction system. ## Give tools an appropriate theory of mind - Future tools should understand users’ intentions and goals. - They need enough agency to assist meaningfully, but not so much that they become intrusive or unpredictable. - Effective assistance depends on balancing automation with user control. ## Treat products and people as works in progress - Products should be viewed as successive versions rather than finished objects. - Bugs and improvements are a normal part of continued development. - Designers should apply the same iterative mindset to their own growth. ## Make interfaces disappear - Interfaces should be as seamless and minimal as possible. - Their value lies in enabling an experience, not in drawing attention to themselves. - The ideal interaction removes unnecessary friction between a person and their intention. Bosworth’s practical recommendation is to stay close to human needs, challenge conventional assumptions, prototype early, and design the entire experience. In emerging fields such as AI and spatial computing, success depends less on polishing familiar interfaces than on inventing simpler, more natural ways for people to accomplish things.

Meet the Makers Defining Tech’s Next Chapter | Figma Blog (opens in new tab)

The post previews Config 2025 and introduces speakers exploring how technology can become more human-centered. Their work spans AI-native devices, creator tools, AI interfaces, and expressive robotics. Together, they suggest that technology’s next chapter will depend not only on technical capability, but also on accessibility, empathy, and thoughtful design. ## Config 2025 and Its Vision - Figma’s Config conference will take place in San Francisco from May 6–8 and in London on May 14. - The event will examine how AI and automation are changing the way people create and experience technology. - Figma emphasizes tools and experiences that respond to evolving human needs. - In-person London tickets are sold out, while San Francisco tickets and free virtual attendance remain available. ## Building the Next Computing Platform - Andrew “Boz” Bosworth, Meta’s CTO and Head of Reality Labs, began coding through a 4-H club and later taught Mark Zuckerberg’s AI class at Harvard. - As Facebook’s 10th engineer, he helped create the News Feed. - He now leads Meta’s work on AR glasses, mixed-reality headsets, and the metaverse. - Bosworth envisions AI-native devices and proactive, personalized assistants becoming part of everyday computing. - At Config, he will discuss Meta’s efforts to develop a new computing platform. ## Making Creator Tools More Inclusive - Ebi Atawodi, Director of Product Management for YouTube Studio, combines experience in literature, technology, and product leadership. - Her work focuses on helping creators develop ideas and reach new audiences, including through AI-powered features. - Atawodi stresses that technology must be accessible and designed for people who have historically felt excluded by products. - Her approach centers on creating tools that serve a broad range of creators rather than assuming a single user experience. ## Designing Interfaces for Advanced AI - Joel Lewenstein, Head of Product Design at Anthropic, works on the interface for Claude. - He compares designing AI systems to watching a child discover new abilities, highlighting the uncertainty and possibility of emerging technology. - AI’s growing sophistication challenges traditional assumptions about how software interfaces should work. - Lewenstein argues that strong designers are defined more by how they think than by experience in a particular industry. ## Giving Robots Personality - Dr. Madeline Gannon uses her research studio, Atonaton, to transform industrial robots into expressive, lifelike mechanical creatures. - Supported by a Knight Foundation grant, she investigates how art and empathy can influence relationships with autonomous machines. - Her work explores how easily people attribute life and intention to nonliving objects. - Rather than reproducing the complexity of the human mind, Gannon demonstrates how movement, appearance, and context can make robots feel animated. Config’s featured makers represent a broad view of technological progress: more capable devices and systems must also be accessible, intuitive, expressive, and emotionally resonant. The conference aims to explore that balance through the experiences of people actively shaping AI, design, and robotics.

Google’s AR Design Guidelines suffice while Apple’s fall short | Figma Blog (opens in new tab)

Mobile AR platforms from Apple and Google made immersive 3D experiences accessible to mainstream app developers, but their design guidance remains limited. The author argues that Google’s guidelines are more practical and comprehensive than Apple’s, particularly for object placement and onboarding, yet both focus mostly on simple single-scene experiences. Designers must therefore develop their own best practices for complex, interactive, and collaborative AR applications. ## AR Design Becomes Mainstream - ARKit and ARCore shifted 3D UX from specialized VR hardware to mobile devices potentially reaching hundreds of millions of users. - Designers accustomed to mature 2D workflows faced unfamiliar 3D concepts and fragmented tools borrowed from gaming, film, architecture, and engineering. - Apple and Google responded with dedicated augmented-reality design guidelines. ## Where Both Guidelines Fall Short - Both focus primarily on simple object placement and sticker-like experiences. - They do not adequately address: - Object selection and hidden-object interaction - Conditional behaviors - Branching storyboards and scene flows - Teleportation and portals - Physical gestures - Multi-scene applications - Triggered or timed animation - Shared and collaborative AR environments - This narrow scope limits guidance for creating deeper personalization, state changes, and immersive interaction. ## Google’s Guidelines Compared with Apple’s - Apple’s guidance is relatively brief and concentrates largely on placing objects on detected surfaces. - Google provides more practical coverage, including: - Tap-to-place - Drag-to-place - Free placement - Realism and basic physics - UI components - Onboarding and experience design - The author questions Google’s assumptions that objects should generally be placed within the user’s reach, since AR may also involve throwing, pointing, or interacting with distant objects. - Despite its gaps, Google’s guidance is considered the stronger starting point and appears to be evolving. ## Designers Must Define New Best Practices - Official guidelines cannot keep pace with the breadth of experimentation by AR designers and developers. - Individuals such as Unity designer Bushra Mahmood have created more extensive independent AR guidance. - Other teams are assembling new workflows from existing tools to prototype functional AR applications. - This grassroots experimentation may help establish 3D UX conventions before immersive headsets become widespread. Apple and Google provide useful foundations, but neither adequately supports complex AR design. Designers should use Google’s more developed guidance as a starting point while actively creating and sharing patterns for multi-scene, interactive, animated, and collaborative experiences.