When Walmart launched its virtual fitting room back in March, it gave you 50 models with various body types and heights to choose from. It was up to you to find the model you resemble the most, so you can see what a piece of garment would look like on you. Now, the retailer is leveling up the experience by letting you virtually try clothes on your own photos.
In the company’s announcement, Apparel and Private Brands EVP Denise Incandela said its virtual fitting room can show how clothes fit in a realistic way. It doesn’t simply overlay images on your photos — when you choose an item to fit, you’ll see the parts where shadows would fall and you’ll see how the fabric would drape on your body. Theoretically, that means different sizes of the same item would look differently on your photo in the same way they’d fall differently on your body if you were trying them in real life. That’s made possible with the use of algorithms and machine learning models originally used to develop accurate topographic images.
The new virtual try-on experience is available for 270,000 items across brands on Walmart’s website, including Levi’s and Hanes, and will continue to grow. You can’t use previous photos with the feature, though: The first time you choose “yourself” as a model when you tap the “Try It On” button, you’ll be prompted to take a photo of yourself wearing something form-fitting and to input your height.
The upgraded experience is now available on Walmart’s iOS app, and iOS users be able to use the photos they take on mobile when they fire up the experience on desktop or the web “shortly.” The feature will roll out to Android users in the coming weeks, as well.