Thanks to the applications that exist, in addition to the hardware and software improvement of smartphones in recent years, mobile phones are capable of doing more and more things. In Europe, Android and iOS users can see what the furniture in our home would look like thanks to augmented reality to control an air fryer.
There are also other types of applications that allow you to use your mobile phone as a tool, either level an image or measure an object that we have at home. For the latter we use the device’s camera, and there are several applications capable of doing this, although it is something that always raises the question of whether it is really reliable.
At EL ESPAÑOL – El Androide Libre we wanted to test some of these applications to find out if it is really possible to measure distances using only the mobile camera. For this we used two applications which gave us different results: Distance meter and ARuler.
rangefinder
When we open the application we will see that it is divided into several parts depending on the type of measurement we want to perform. There is the rangefinder which, depending on the size of the user, will be able to calculate the distance to a wall
On the other hand, when measuring height and width, the same thing also happens, since it is a calculation that is carried out taking as reference the distance from the cell phone to said object, whatever something that the user can modify using a bar. at the bottom left and in which You need to choose the approximate distance the object is located. One of the things that most hinders the experience in this application is the presence of advertising, which is sometimes displayed in full screen.
rangefinder
Free Android
If the user estimates this distance correctly, the approximate result can be good, even if it is very difficult to be precise, so it is a little complicated for this type of applications which require indicating the distance to be reliable. At the end, it all depends on who is holding the cell phone know how far you are holding it, so your results are not consistent and change depending on each person. In the measurement that appears in the image, for example, it was quite close, with an error of 1.5 cm.
There is also an option to calculate the length of each object in a taken photo, but to use it you need to view an ad first, in order to unlock the premium feature. In this case You can draw a line to measure any object in a photograph that we took, although in this case we will also have to indicate the distance at which the photo was taken. In short, it is not the most reliable method to do it freehand, although there are other alternatives that may be more useful.
A ruler
In this case, the application does not ask you to manually enter the data to estimate the size of an object, but rather an estimate is made automatically. This means that the user simply has to hold the device facing the surface of the object to be measured, in addition to having better performance at the application level itself.
To complete the entire process, you must wait for the application to detect the surface it is taking as a reference and allow you to start drawing lines to measure. In the tests we have carried out, the results have been irregular, as there have been occasions where You accurately guessed the height or width measurement in centimeters of certain objects. However, other times it overestimated the distances, offering a measurement that is not close to reality.
A ruler
Free Android
Despite this, if measurements are repeated several times, the correct measurement is usually obtained, although this can only be known by having a tape measure or ruler at your side to compare. Despite this, in many cases it can give a good idea of the approximate measurement of an object, and therefore can be useful in specific situations in which a precise result is not necessary.
However, to measure the house that plans to do a renovation or buy a piece of furniture, These types of apps are not strongly recommended, and the best option is to wait until you have a traditional meter or a laser meter. Regardless, it is great news to see that this type of applications are increasingly offering better results, and it is very likely that in the near future we will see more alternatives capable of calculating the distances with greater precision, although the human factor will always be present. determining factor so that the calculations carried out by the mobile phone can be carried out correctly.
